Crucible
by Sister-to-the-Queen
Summary: My take on what happened after afrai's story 'The Sacred and the Profane'. Brace yourself.
1. Prologue: Sacrifice

_Okay, here it is. My third story._

_First up, I'd like to state that I have vowed never, ever again to write a follow-up to anyone else's fanfiction. Ever. I have sworn it, I will stand by it._

_That said, this is indeed a sequel to something. To 'The Sacred and the Profane', by afrai. It's to her that all credit goes for the creation of this AU, and it is truly a remarkable achievement, as grand as it is heart-tearing. Her AU, in turn, was based on 'Good Omens', which belongs to Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. No personal profit was intended with the writing of this story. God no._

_Still, a warning is in order. Even more so than was the case for my previous two stories, it is absolutely essential that you read her story - which can be found in my Favourites section - in order to understand anything of what mine is about. However. Unless your tolerance for sadness is incredibly high, I do not recommend doing this. Instead, believe me, you would do well to close this screen right now, and move to happier places. I am not kidding._

_A _big _thank-you goes to Clear Dawnlight and Thrice Seven Once Eleven, for reading my story back when I had no intention of ever putting it up, and for encouraging me to do so anyway. I am eternally grateful to the both of them for this._

_I'd also like to thank Clear Dawnlight for sticking by me throughout the writing process, and Thrice Seven Once Eleven for putting the opening quote in my head and contributing to the soundtrack, which can be found on my profile page, to be updated from time to time. If you can spare a couple of minutes, I do hope you'll listen to the songs: they were chosen with care, let me tell you._

_Here, then, for those who can take it, is my story. I'd say, "Enjoy," but that's not the right word here._

_Warnings: AU, slash, language, mild sexual themes._

_–––_

**_Crucible_**

_We love what we love. Reason does not enter into it. In  
><em>_many ways, unwise love is the truest love. Anyone can  
><em>_love a thing because. That's as easy as putting a penny  
><em>_in your pocket. But to love something_ despite_. To know  
><em>_the flaws and love them too. That is rare and pure and perfect.__  
><em>

_- Patrick Rothfuss, 'The Wise Man's Fear'_

_Prologue_

_Sacrifice_

___–––_

_15th August, 2006_

A boy was sitting slouched on a bench in St James's Park.

He looked to be sixteen years old, or thereabouts, dressed in a pair of faded jeans and an old T-shirt. He was staring, through wisps of curly blond hair falling over his forehead, at a dark-haired man standing over by the duckpond, some distance away. The man's head was lowered, and he had his back to the boy. He did not move.

After some time, a little girl, certainly no more than five years old, her brown hair in two ponytails, and a picture of a sheep on her blue dress, came walking down the path that led by the bench, and clambered up to sit next to the boy. Neither of them acknowledged the other's presence. They simply sat there, side by side, the eyes of each fixed unwaveringly on the same point. If anyone had been there to see them, they would have been shocked by the looks of grim seriousness on such young faces.

Eventually, the man could be seen to shudder, and tore himself away from the fence surrounding the pond. He all but ran from the park, long coat billowing up behind him, unaware of the two watching him go.

The sound of hurried footsteps receding.

Silence.

The boy said, "It's been five years."

The girl nodded. "Yes. It has."

"How long will it go on?"

"Long," she replied. "Not sure how long. But long."

There was another pause. Then the boy said, "You know, I offered to give 'im back to 'im, but 'e wouldn't let me." He turned to the girl, asked her, "It's because 'e's good, innit?"

"The best," she answered gloomily.

The boy pondered this, then shook his head in frustration. "I should never 'ave listened to 'im. I should 'ave done it anyway. Then it wouldn't 'ave come to... this..." His voice trailed off, and he shivered in spite of the heat.

The girl said, "You could have, yes, but that was not the way. It still isn't, even now." She looked at him. "Are you afraid?"

Blue eyes met hazel ones, and quickly looked away. "A little," the boy admitted. "Aren't you? You're so much younger than me."

"Am I?" She shook her head, shrugged. "No, I'm not afraid. I can't say I like the idea, of course, but I am not afraid. Not anymore. Not like the first time. This time, I know what to expect."

The boy fidgeted. "Will it take very long? The thing itself, I mean?"

She smiled, though it never reached her eyes. "No longer than a pinprick, and just as painful. There and gone. Don't worry."

"And we have no other choice, do we," he said. It wasn't a question.

"We have no other choice, my brother," she echoed his words. "I know how hard it is for you, and how much trust I ask, but if we do not do this, the other will never be able to see us, and be healed." She sighed. "Neither of them will. For only the sins are shown there where he is now, and only those sins from which a soul may learn. Else what would be the point?"

There was yet another long silence. The boy spoke again, his voice soft and subdued. "Did he," indicating the direction the man had run off in, "ever know you were born, sister?"

"He didn't," she answered, in the same tone.

The boy frowned. "Isn't that cruel?"

"Not in the least: it is a mercy. Can you even begin to imagine what he would have felt if he _had_ known? Now, at least, for all his misery, he has the consolation, however small, of being able to believe that what he did was right. Whereas the knowledge that I existed, and that he would not be able to stop what is about to take place, for the sake of him and the other, that would have dealt him a killing blow. There is only so much that a heart can take, brother, even the heart of an angel."

She stopped talking, sniffled once. Then, without warning, she burst into tears. Not loud and impetuous, like a child would: these were the near-silent, agonised tears of one who had seen suffering and sorrow, in all the myriad forms it took, and was torn by the memories of it, now more than ever. "All his life," she choked out, "he did only what was right, always what he had to do. But, oh, how I wish that one act had not been necessary. It was the very moment I was born, you know," and she curled up in a ball, hugging her knees, "and I screamed and screamed along with him. Oh, I know you were there in spirit, and saw it, but you were too young to understand. But I, I felt it, in that moment, I felt his pain, like knives in my heart. And I've never been able to forget. It haunts my nightmares, even now."

The boy bit his lip, very near tears himself, and reached out to give the girl a clumsy pat on the head. "There, there, little sister," he said. "We'll fix it."

Somewhere in Asia, the earth trembled.

The girl looked up at him and smiled, genuinely this time. "That's true," she said. "That's true."

"And besides," he added encouragingly, "your father was the one who told you we had to do this, so we can't go wrong."

"Actually," she took a deep breath, "he wasn't."

For a few seconds, the boy could find no words. Finally, he said, "..._what_?"

She sighed again. "I haven't heard from him, not a syllable, in years. No matter how I've tried, he won't answer me," she said, looking up to the sky, where rainclouds were forming.

The boy gaped, burst out, "But then how can you know -"

"I don't. I've never really _known_ anything, strictly speaking. I've always acted according to what I feel. I've never had anything else to guide me." She looked up sharply. "It's time. Have you said your goodbyes?" she asked.

He nodded, swallowed. "I've left everyone a letter, like you told me to. I... hope they'll all understand. If not..." He shrugged. "Choices we make. And you, have you left -"

"No need. It doesn't matter to me whether the orphanage understands or not. As you say, choices we make. Well, come on," she said, sliding off the bench. "It's almost here." She took hold of two of the boy's fingers, all her tiny hand could manage, and gave him an impatient tug.

There was a mild earthquake, somewhere in the Middle East.

Obediently, the boy got up, and let the girl drag him along for a bit. Soon, however, he pulled free, picked up the girl, and gave her a cuddle. "We're in this together," he said, tickled her a little, and placed a tap of a kiss on her nose. She giggled and laughed, and flung her arms around his neck.

In the land of Israel, a city shook upon its foundations.

"So then, little big brother. Shall we?"

"Well then, big little sister. We shall."

The two of them, the boy still carrying the girl, walked out of the park, chatting happily about this and that. Laughter bubbled up from them every now and then.

–––

Standing silent, alone in the shadows, Death watched them go. They'd be crossing the road any minute now. His fist, the one that wasn't holding the scythe, tightened convulsively.

There was a loud screeching of brakes, a dull thud, cries of dismay. Many people, Death knew, had instantly whipped out their cellphones, and called an ambulance, desperately, pointlessly. Others, also many, were calling the truck driver a murderer, disregarding how badly in shock he was. The doctors, when they came, would declare that the children had not suffered, that they had died upon impact. Witnesses would state to the police that they couldn't understand what had possessed the boy; that he'd looked neither left nor right, but had stepped blindly out onto the road. None present there would ever be able to forget the serene, contented smiles on the faces of the dead, or the way that they still held each other's crushed bodies embraced, as their blood pooled out. The sight would stay with them forever.

Sometimes, Death truly hated his job.

And in the ancient city of Jerusalem, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre...

... collapsed.


	2. Chapter One: Burn

_A/N: Please take a moment to have a look at these:_

_lunissa. deviantart gallery/ #/ d56r2fb  
>lunissa. deviantart gallery #/ d56r3b0  
>lunissa. deviantart gallery #/ d56r3ya_

_Thank you._

_–––_

_Chapter One_

_Burn_

_–––_

Sometimes, he felt as though he were hanging on by a string.

The pain had not grown less, with the passing of years. He was beginning to suspect that it could not. Adam had been right, it seemed, so long ago. Of course.

The boy had been dead for more than two centuries now. Caphriel had heard about it at the time, he remembered vaguely. One of the humans had told him, at St James's Park.

Anathema Device.

–––

_She approached him slowly from behind, desperately wishing she could travel an hour forward in time. She really, really didn't want to have to talk to this man... being... again. But she knew that she had no choice._

_That morning, very early, even before dawn, she'd woken up screaming. Newt, frightened and upset, had asked her what on earth was the matter. He'd had to repeat the question five times, more and more urgently, ere she'd answered. When she finally did, her only words had been, "I must go speak to him."_

_"To who?"_

_"The angel."_

_There had been a rather long period of silence then. Silence from Newt, that was. All the while, a furious gale had been roaring in Anathema's head and heart, making her actually twitch in barely-contained agitation._

_"Anathema, are you mad? We'd agreed to put all this behind us! The whole affair is _over_, there's -"_

_"Don't hinder me," she'd just managed to grind out between her teeth. "I... Must... Go."_

_"But -"_

_"_Newt!_"_

_If there was one thing her Newt had learned, after five years of marriage, it was that he had better not try to get in his wife's way when she took on that tone of voice. He knew it, and he acted accordingly, saying, with obligatory testiness, "All right. You know what you're doing, I suppose. You always do. Just..." And he turned her shock-white face towards him, looked at her with dead seriousness. "Just be careful, you understand? He's mad."_

_—_

_The thing that had whipped her awake that morning had been fairly straightforward, in its way. A simple request, nothing more, but one that any creature, living or dead, would have been powerless to resist. Accordingly, she hadn't even tried to. Not that this made things any easier._

_Certain sensitive humans, like Anathema, could, on occasion, be affected so strongly by extremes of negative emotion - sorrow, in this particular case - that it was like standing in the path of an avalanche of stone, and the urge to run away, as fast as their feet would carry them, became almost impossible to resist. Indeed, even now, still several yards away from him, it felt as though she was knowingly walking into quicksand, sucking her in. It was a huge effort to keep moving forward, every muscle struggling against her, wanting to put all its power into racing home, where Newt was, where she could feel safe._

_She fought down the ignoble weakness. She, no, the whole _world_, owed him so much more than this. And it was a debt that could never be repaid._

_She hadn't wanted to ever tell him, and had told her husband so, when word had reached them the day before. The two of them had agreed that it would be a mercy not to. But certain summons cannot be denied, ever, no matter what conscience declares. There was a reason for this, she knew it, and it was what she had to trust in._

_She glanced around quickly. Not a soul in sight. Good. She gathered her resolve, and tapped him on the shoulder. "Caphriel?"_

_He turned, and Anathema couldn't help but shake like a leaf when she saw those sunglasses again. God, even the faintest inkling of what lived, or rather, no longer lived, behind them..._

_She must have been staring and hesitating for too long, because he said, "Yes? What is it?"_

_Oh, but he sounded so dead, so dead his voice, like the grating of a mausoleum gate. And as for what lay buried there, her mind cowered at the thought._

_"Have you... heard?" she stammered. All she could force her tongue to say._

_"Heard what?"_

_Aaah..._

_She grasped hold of her arms, hugging herself. She had to hurry, she was going to snap and bolt any minute now._

_"Heard about... about what happened to Adam Young," she said, lips going numb. She lowered her gaze; she couldn't look at him anymore. She took a deep, much-needed breath, and went on, "He's dead. Traffic accident, hit by a truck, and... someone else died with him." She almost bit off her tongue when she realised what she'd just said. Oh God, that hadn't been part of the orders she'd received, she'd been forbidden to do it, even. What would those two say now?_

_Suppressing this extra source of panic, which she really did _not _need right now, she waited for a reaction, _any_ reaction. None came, and Anathema's heart sank within her. She glanced up quickly, then cast down her eyes again. Not the slightest bit of expression on his face. An absolute blank. So, so far gone... Helplessly, soundlessly, she began to cry._

_"Who died with him?" he asked, and she could tell that the question was purely automatic, straight from the vocal cords. She knew the answer, of course she did, it had been in the letter and it had been in the vision in her sleep, but she'd condemn herself to inquisitorial torture sooner than give it to him._

_"I... don't know. Someone," she replied lamely._

_There was a long pause. She felt, Anathema, as though she was standing in the eye of a hurricane, ready at any moment to bear down upon her._

_And all too soon, it did._

_"Dead," he said._

_She jerked. "Eh?"_

_"Adam Young is dead."_

_"Yes, and it was -"_

_He let out a laugh, a hideous sound, and Anathema shuddered._

_"Five years, only five years after _it_ happened, and he's dead. And it was that life, that was the catalyst, it was because of that that I..." His voice cracked, and Anathema's eyes grew wide when she saw tears start to leak out from under his sunglasses. At once, the psychic shock hit her, and she nearly doubled up. Gritting her teeth to keep from being sick then and there, she said, or rather groaned, "Caphriel..."_

_"I killed him." And again, "I killed him."_

_"Caphriel... Please, stop..."_

_"I killed him, I killed him, I killed him, I..." Over and over again, in a monotone, faster and faster, his voice so low that Anathema could barely hear it, his breath hitching at every repetition._

_"Stop... Stop... Stop..." with her palms on her ears and her fingers twisting in her hair._

_And then the name was spoken. The name that she'd prayed she'd never have to hear again._

_"I killed him... Zirah..."_

_"Caphriel, for the love of God, _stop_!" she cried, hysterical._

_She was on her knees now, clutching at her head, eyes wild, face contorted with horror and heart thundering in her breast. She'd thought she'd been about to snap and bolt _before_, but now... And yet, think of it, and in that very moment she did think of it, what she was experiencing now, however nightmarish, was but the merest resonance of this man's pain. Her soul shrank with pity. How great a heart, to bear so much..._

_He sighed, and it was like a breeze over a graveyard. "For the love of God. Right. Of course. How wonderful." Bitter as bile._

_Oh, nooo..._

_She struggled to her feet, her every human instinct screaming at her to at least _try_ and offer some minimal comfort, instincts powerful enough to override even the wild-animal desire to flee and never stop. "Caphriel," she began, and faltered. She began again. "Caphriel, I..." Only to fall flat before the sheer ludicrousness that was the notion of attempting to console such a one._

_Finally, she grasped his gloved hands - why would he be wearing leather gloves during a heatwave, she wondered, insanely - squeezed them tight, took a deep breath, and said, "I'll pray for you."_

_Then, at last, she ran._

_–––_

True to his word, he really _had_ tried to burn that walking stick. He'd taken it to a deserted field, outside the city - for he would have no-one witness this but him - built a neat little bonfire, and thrown the stick on it.

He'd watched the flames begin to lick at it, burn at it, just as far hotter flames had once, long, long ago, burned at... at...

Seven seconds, no more. That was how long he'd been able to stand there and watch. The next second, he'd been on his knees, reaching with bare hands into the fire, desperate to save hi- it, it, _it_! He'd pressed it against him, against his chest, against his neck, running his hands, burned and blackened, up and down its length, all the while sobbing out declarations of undying love, interspersed with wild pleas for forgiveness.

Many hours later, when the fire had gone out for lack of fuel, he'd still been kneeling there, though his voice had long tapered off. The sobs hadn't, though.

He never bothered to heal his injuries: he hid them. The black leather gloves scoured his molten skin, and red cracks would form when he flexed his fingers or made a fist. His hands were almost always balled into fists, and it hurt, and badly, but who cared? That meant that it was right. A simple scarf was enough for the mark on his neck.

–––

The bookshop was torture, plain and simple. He hadn't even attempted to set it on fire: it was completely impossible. The walking stick had been a mere tool, only used once. (_Twice_, a voice would always whisper, viciously. He accepted this, and ignored it.) The shop, the books, had been something that Zirah had loved. The only thing, most likely. This, too, Caphriel accepted. Was there a choice?

Caphriel lived there, now.

Oh, he still did his job, with honour, dedication, and utter loathing, travelling all over the world, for years, even decades at a time, but he would always return to that one London building, that time never seemed to touch. He was always there, in a way. It was the only place in all the world where he could still be said to live, a little.

Wandering aimlessly around the shop, for days on end, running his fingers over the spines of the books, gently, softly, without looking at them. Crying the nights away, hiding under the covers of the little bed upstairs.

Torment.

But torment that he could not exist without, because it was the only thing that made him feel close to the one he'd loved, did love, always would, from here to eternity.

Zirah.

'Fine', he'd try to assure himself he'd be, from time to time.

Madness.

–––

"It is a mercy," she had said. She had been right, for the addition, to everything else, of the knowledge that had been deliberately kept hidden would merely have augmented and made more pungent this slow, creeping misery.

So here he was, then.

His own, merciful Hell.

How ironic.


	3. First Interlude: Unworthy

_A/N: Everyone, please take a moment to have a look at this:_

_lunissa. deviantart gallery/ #/ d56mvux_

_Thank you._

_–––_

_First Interlude_

_Unworthy_

_–––_

"You... You wretches! You blind, twisted freaks! How _could_ you? What were you _thinking_? Why us, and not him? What made -"

Hastur stopped ranting when a cloud of noxious black smoke came drifting by, and caused him to collapse to the ground, gagging and wheezing, only to jump up again, screaming, when the white-hot sand scorched his unprotected flesh. "Aaagh, you cursed little -"

"Oh, give it over, Hastur," said a weary voice. "It's not worth it, it won't change anything. Just accept it, like I do. You'll be much better off."

For a few seconds, Hastur actually forgot to pay attention to the pain. He could only stare, open-mouthed, at his long-time associate, currently immersed up to the neck in a stream of molten lava, and looking decidedly resigned about it. Then Hastur's face, a face already made even more grotesque than usual by the flickering red light reflecting off the cavern's black walls, twisted into a snarl, and he barked, "_Accept_ it? Ligur, have you gone completely mad? We've been condemned to eternal torture, here in the Pit! Those two could have prevented that, could have kept us out after we died, but no! The only one they chose out of all our endless legions was a bloody murdering psychopath, ten times worse than any of us could ever be! Where's the sense in that, where's the _sanity _in that? And you want me to clasp my hands together and actually _thank_ them for it? Ha! Oh yes, you have gone mad! You sick little fuckers!" he finished, raging at the bottomless blackness that was the ceiling.

"I didn't say thank them, you know," said Ligur. "And I haven't gone mad. I've just been thinking."

"Same thing," Hastur replied savagely, dancing around to cool the soles of his feet. A great stone came flying out of nowhere, and hit him on the back of the head. He fell upon the sand again, and shrieked, and rolled around in agony.

Ligur continued, as though he hadn't been interrupted. "I've been thinking that maybe, just maybe, those two knew exactly what they were doing. I mean, he was the Son of our Master, and she was... You know. I think..."

"You think, you think!"

"... that people like that have reasons for everything they do. We just can't see 'em. If they didn't keep us out of this place, I s'pose they reckoned we weren't good enough for that. But maybe they, I don't know, saw something in him."

Hastur, who had scrambled back up by now, shook his head in stunned rage. "I can't believe I'm hearing this! So you _think_ they deemed that homicidal maniac worthy of salvation, and two normal, decent demons like us _un_worthy, because they had good _reasons_? Well, you're certainly more clever than I am, Ligur," voice dripping with sarcasm, "because I sure as bloody _Hell_ can't see it!"

"We all get what we deserve..."

"Shut up! Just shut _up_! You're fucking insane, d'you hear, as insane as he was, cracked as an angel, and I'm stuck here with you!"

"...and you might see it, someday," mused Ligur, ignoring his shrieking colleague, and tilting his head back to peer up at the darkness overhead. "Someday... Who knows?"

And above, high, high above the two of them, Three were wandering the plains of a land in ruin.


	4. Chapter Two: Hope

_A/N: Everyone, please take a look at this:_

_lunissa. deviantart gallery/ #/ d56lx2d_

_Thank you._

_–––_

_Chapter Two_

_Hope_

_–––_

Sometimes, Aziraphale wondered how long he'd been here.

It was hard to tell the passage of time when there were no days to count by, and no distinctive landmarks to help measure the distance travelled. It was perpetual night here, with a million shining stars twinkling above his head, bathing everything in silvery light, almost as bright as the light of day. The desert through which he passed, too, was ever the same: sweeping plains of black sand, fine as flour, never stirred by wind, dotted with low dunes, and cut from horizon to horizon by a meandering path. The mountains, far, far away, never seemed to come any closer.

Truth be told, none of this bothered him. The unchanging black-and-white starkness of his surroundings acted on him as a kind of anodyne, a kind of relief, when the vile sludge that had been his life came bubbling up higher than he could stand.

He was a demon.

He was a demon, and what a monster, what a complete insane monster he had been in life. Killing and murder, killing and murder and torture, his indifferent delights, always, always done with a smile and a tranquil... not a tranquil mind, for that he had never had, but a tranquil heart, certainly. Never once in his entire physical existence, whether in Hell or on Earth, had he seen himself as anything less than righteous. Never once, until he came here, had he seen himself for the living horror he truly was. He'd thought himself a saint.

Monster.

Still, underneath the helpless resignation of realisation - for he could not undo the past, no matter how he wanted to - far underneath, the feeling of hurt, of having been wronged, remained lingering, all the time.

–––

Back when he had only been here for a few... years, he supposed... he had taken up the habit of sitting down every now and then, by the side of the path he followed, to rest for a little while. It was at those times, when his now curiously clear mind was no longer even partially occupied with walking, that he would feel a stirring deep inside him somewhere, an incredibly vague sensation of having forgotten something. Or rather, of not having _quite_ forgotten it, as though it - or they, if it was a person; Aziraphale wasn't sure - had been covered in a heavy veil, impossible to peer through.

If he remained seated for too long, things would develop, and he'd get an uneasy feeling of additional guilt, as though whatever it was that he'd let slip from his memories, was something that it was unpardonable not to be able to recall. Something ancient, vastly familiar. But the more he'd try to remember, with all his might, what it was, the further it would retreat behind the veil. Honestly, it was rather maddening.

As soon as he'd get up and start to walk, though, the feeling would disappear, leaving not a trace behind.

Or hardly a trace, at any rate.

–––

There was something glimmering in the distance. He stopped, squinted, trying to make out what it was.

Hmmm... It reminded him of the way a pane of glass, or the surface of a pool, would reflect the light of the moon. Or of the stars, in this place.

Oh, nonsense. Such things simply didn't exist, here in the endless desert. Here, there were only sand, stars, night, a path... and him, all alone. It was just his eyes playing tricks on him, nothing more. He shook his head in annoyance at himself, and went on walking.

After about a minute, he stopped again, blinked. Wait a moment, the outline of the thing... That almost looked like... like a...

He broke into a run, and kept on running until he was some ten feet away from it, at which point he stopped, astonished. So he'd been right. His sight hadn't deceived him, after all.

It was a mirror. A big, old-fashioned mirror, seven feet tall and four feet wide, with black glass, and with a frame of what looked like ebony, elaborately carved in a repeating pattern of flames. It stood there, across the path, upright and unsupported by anything, the first earthly object he'd seen in, well, in a very long time, and it frightened Aziraphale to the marrow.

It looked so strange, so alien, so utterly out of place in the landscape, so... _normal_, in short, that it was a fiendish abnormality, an unwelcome relic from a world he'd left behind - or had been made to leave behind, whichever, he couldn't recall - and he wanted to get away from it, get back to the safety of monotony... But then he began to feel curious. That wasn't regular glass.

Cautiously, hesitantly, he approached it, and examined the smooth surface. It was indeed completely black, and it did indeed reflect the starlight, but on closer inspection, there was something swirling here and there, rather like he imagined the sand would, were there ever any wind. He tapped it with a finger. It was dry, and resilient, but it rippled a little when he touched it. He blinked again. What in the...

And then, in the space of half a second, the screen of whatever-it-was was swept clean from the inside. Aziraphale squeaked in surprise, staggered back, and fell down. He stayed like that, staring and gaping at the picture that had been revealed.

Hastur and Ligur.

In Hell, being tortured.

Aziraphale believed he could have named the very chamber they were in. And no wonder. Watching the goings-on in those sections of the Pit had once been one of his favoured pastimes, after all. He clenched his teeth and pressed a fist against his mouth, as a wave of nausea and self-loathing washed over him.

Monster... _Monster..._ God... Have mercy...

Sweating, shaking, and dry heaving, he looked again at the tableau before him. Hastur, naked, twisting like a worm on burning sand, face contorted in a soundless scream, fingers bent like claws, rending the air. Ligur, sitting or standing in a lava stream, with, incredibly, a calm, rather pensive expression.

Slowly, something began to dawn on Aziraphale, working its way through the nausea. Hastur and Ligur were in Hell, condemned to everlasting torment - for, somehow, it didn't even occur to Aziraphale to doubt the reality of what the mirror showed him - and he, who had killed them, he was here, free of pain, of physical pain at least, sentenced to nothing more than moving through a desert and thinking on his life, which punishment, however nightmarish it often was, might, for all he knew, come to an end, someday.

Odd.

Why this difference? Had he not been far worse than they? Perhaps, and he trembled in fear at the thought, perhaps he had, accordingly, been destined for far worse a fate. But then, why had he seen no signs of this yet, after so long? He frowned. That wouldn't make any sense. Of course, a great many things had never made sense to him. Like why it was apparently right to be damned for thinking the wrong thought, at the wrong place, at the wrong time.

The old hurt came surging up again, but there was no flaring of fury inside him now, as this memory went through his mind. No: he'd come to terms with his true nature, long ago. Not with his deeds, oh no, but with what he was. After all, there could be even more terrible things than merely being a demon.

He smiled, albeit wryly, at the change that had taken place within him, with time and reflection, when a jolt of fierce agony went through him, like a slice at his heartstrings, and he shrieked and his voice shredded the silence and for a single instant he'd been about to peek under the veil, had been _at the very edge of remembering..._

Then the moment was gone, and he lay looking up at the stars without seeing them, panting and spreadeagled, wondering what in the world had just happened. He felt, for some reason, that it was connected with his thinking about a state more terrible than... Oh, never mind. His mind was much too foggy for that right now.

But he did understand something else, now, spiritual shocks notwithstanding. The image in the mirror, whoever, whatever had sent it, was meant to do one thing and one thing only: to tell him that he was destined, not for something worse, as he had briefly feared, but for something _better_... He had no idea how he knew this, exactly, but he was certain of it, nevertheless. And it felt good.

There was a curious sort of whooshing sound.

Aziraphale looked up, and found that the mirror was gone. All that was left of it was a heap of sand on the path.

Aziraphale got up, gingerly stepped over the heap, and continued on his way.


	5. Chapter Three: Illusions

_A/N: Please take the time to have a look at this: www. lunissa. deviantart. com/ art/ Lost-angels-268996811_

_Thank you._

_–––_

_Chapter Three_

_Illusions_

_–––_

Caphriel hated Zirah now.

He hated him.

He hated him.

Yes, he hated him.

If he could believe that he hated him.

It _was_ possible. He could do it. He even managed, sometimes. It was really quite simple, like walking on a tightrope. The trick was to concentrate, to focus on anything and everything other than the crossing of the cord. Hard work was an excellent diversion, effective for whole minutes at a time. And there was always plenty of work in the world for an angel.

The humans he aided, always without their knowledge, generally thought him a bizarre character, possibly dangerous, and almost certainly on heavy drugs. It was the only explanation they could think of for his appearance. Tall, gaunt, pale, obviously underfed and sleep-deprived, dressing only in black, and married to his gloves, scarf, and black sunglasses.

And his behaviour was decidedly off, too, to put it mildly. He'd burst out laughing over the most trivial things, laughter always at least slightly tinged with hysteria, and he'd sometimes go on giggling for over half an hour. For Heaven's sake, even the sight of a Jaffa Cake could set him off!

So, on the whole, people avoided him, called in their children when they saw him coming down the street. Still, no-one ever actually interfered with him. Whether it was because they were afraid of trouble, or because his perpetual air of utter abject misery kept them at bay, he didn't know. And he didn't care, either: it was damned convenient. He was steadily losing the ability to see any shreds of good in his countless charges.

–––

That he never took off the gloves or scarf in public was a given. Humans tended to react badly to the sight of mutilated skin. But being forced to wear his sunglasses at all times was a bloody _pest_. The humans' reactions were even worse now than they had been before.

Of course, it had been unavoidable that _some_ people saw his eyes, in the course of five hundred years. Even a few seconds of taking off the glasses, to ease one of his pounding headaches, could be the cause of an unwanted encounter. After all, even he couldn't be on guard twenty-four hours a day. But where, before, the sight of his eyes would merely cause humans to stare or fall on their knees or something like that, now they could be counted on, guaranteed, to faint, or cry out in horror, or burst into uncontrollable tears.

He'd always wipe their memories immediately afterwards. He still had enough pity left for that.

–––

So he managed quite nicely, all things considered. He did his job, the humans were helped, and he was able to keep himself marginally sane. Everybody was a winner.

But when, after the day's - and, often, the night's - work was over, and he closed the door of whatever dump it was he was currently living in, the pretence would shatter, and everything would come crashing down.

Caphriel loved Zirah.

He loved him.

He loved him.

And that would never change.

His heart was still, would forever be, riveted to a broken angel, to a piece of filth, to the lowest of the low, and Caphriel would have given up his soul to get him back, if only for a single minute.

He knew it, the certainty of it was etched into his brain, and the pain, and the shame of the realisation, never failed to drive him over the edge.

He'd pound his fists, gloveless, against the walls, over and over again, ignoring his neighbours' meaningless complaints, till it felt like his hands were on fire once more, like there were live wires running through his body, from head to foot, starting in his fingers.

A human would have fallen into a coma from the pain, or gone straight into cardiac arrest, but not him. For one thing, he wasn't capable of doing so, and for another, he wouldn't have wanted to even if he had been. The agony of his body could never be as bad as the agony of his heart. Indeed, it soothed him.

Once, and only once, he'd pushed it too far, and had shaken himself into a blood-red shriek, matching the stains on the walls, that had set every grown human in the street rushing outside, thinking there was terrible murder being done. Once, and only once, that very same night, a whole group of people had banged on his door, demanding to be let in, to be allowed to offer help. He'd opened the door, his gloves back on, and the expression on his face, even with his sunglasses, had been enough to send the visitors fleeing like stricken deer, every last one of them. Caphriel had calmly shut the door again, turned on his heel, and lost consciousness right where he stood.

Truly, the string was fraying.

–––

He'd left that particular town the next morning, the same way he left every town, walking, with a small suitcase in one hand and an exquisitely carved walking stick in the other, which he never used for its intended purpose.

Everyone remained indoors that day, as he passed out of their street. None were able to work up the courage to go outside. This was not cowardice. It was pure instinct, animalistic and irresistible, that kept them shackled against their will.

Perhaps Caphriel would have derived a mite of comfort from the knowledge that dozens of eyes, male and female, young and old, filled with deep compassion, were watching him as he went.

Then again, probably not.


	6. Second Interlude: Humanity

_A/N: Please, take a moment to have a look at this: lunissa. deviantart. com/ gallery/ #/ d4gsy7c_

_Thank you._

_–––_

_Second Interlude_

_Humanity_

_–––_

"It all just seems so strange to me, these days," the woman said suddenly, as she shook out her long, auburn hair.

"What does?" asked the pale boy.

"This." And she spread out her arms to encompass the torn land around them, the corpses and bomb craters, the clouds of toxic gas under a blood-red sky, the few survivors, scavenging for a scrap of food and a drink of water.

"Look around you, both of you," she continued. "A whole nation, ravaged and ripped to pieces by war, pollution, and famine. How can such things still be, if the three of us are dead? All of this should have died with us, half a millennium ago, yet it always keeps on going. Yes," she said, before either of her two companions could contradict her, "yes, I know it _did_ die, for a very short time, but then it all started right up again. _Why?_"

The boy furrowed his brow for a moment. Then it cleared, and he crossed his legs and went on drawing imaginary shapes in the dirt he could no longer touch. "Don't think I see what you mean," he said serenely, in his quavery voice.

The woman rolled her orange eyes in exasperation, and waved her arms this way and that. "Oh, come now, Weiss! Think! How can we... How can war, pollution and famine still exist in the world if the three of us aren't there, truly _there_, to bring them about? We were _killed_, we are _powerless_, we didn't cause _any_ of the horrors around us, but they. Are. There. I ask again, how? How is this possible?"

"To me, it seems very simple," said the tall, skinny man in black, with the neatly trimmed beard.

"_Does_ it."

"Yes, Red. It does. I've been thinking about this for a long time, and it seems to me that, even though we, the three of us sitting here, were cut away from the human world, and can no longer act in it in person, our spirits and influences still remain, in the hearts and minds of men. Even now, the essence of us courses through their veins, too deeply ingrained to ever be uprooted. When you look at it like that, we cannot die."

Red raised an eyebrow at him. "Well, I can certainly tell that you've been thinking about this, Sable." She shrugged, sighed. "If you're right, then it seems to _me_ that the cutting-off part didn't really serve any purpose. Nothing's changed, no matter what _he_ thought."

"In other words, he killed us for nothing," the boy said sombrely, raking his fingers through his white hair.

Now it was the man's turn to sigh. "That's true, kid, that's true. First Red," and he paused as the woman shivered briefly, "then me, brained with my own scales, and finally you. And what a state you were in when you came where we were!" The boy shuddered, and Sable reached out and gave him a comforting pat on the shoulder.

The woman, too, nodded, wincing in sympathy. "What a state, indeed. The two of us, Sable and I, had to force you down to keep you still, and it took us literally hours of talking into you before you finally stopped screaming and calmed down enough to be reasoned with. After a very long time, we at last managed to get you to fall asleep, but even then..." Her voice trailed off.

The boy smiled wanly, but warmly. "I know. You did everything you could to help me. You still do, and I've always been grateful. That won't change. And if I'm not mistaken," and his smile turned just a tiny bit arch, "you, Red, even held my head on your lap while I slept. Am I right?"

Red wriggled, grinning a little awkwardly, and Sable clapped the boy on the shoulder again. The three of them sat in companionable quiet for a little while, until Sable raised his head, and said to the woman, "Hold on a moment. Red? Did I really just hear you call everything around us now... horrors? Did I?"

Red fidgeted. "I... Yes. Yes, Sable, you did. It's... Look. I know that these sights and sounds of human misery ought to make me rejoice, fill me with pride, like they always used to, but, since we died... they don't, not anymore, they... make me feel sad. Ashamed. It's been getting worse and worse, with every scene like this that we've encountered over the years. Something odd is happening to me, I've been denying it for centuries, but I... I think I'm seriously starting to lose myself, and I am afraid." She drew up her knees, rested her chin on them, and stared gloomily into the middle distance, twitching, occasionally, whenever a grenade struck, twitching, then scowling.

"I have that, too, to be perfectly honest," said Sable, frowning, after a time. "For just as long as you have, come to think about it. The knowledge that people around me are busy starving to death no longer affords me delight the way it did, way back when. It'd simply feel wrong, somehow, to enjoy it. And yet... And yet I can't rid myself of the notion that for some reason, the consequences of our influence are _right_, even though I sometimes wish they weren't there at all. You may be right, Red," he finished, pensively. "We really are losing ourselves."

"I don't think we are. I think I know what this is, this feeling that things are right," said the boy, looking up at the poisoned sky with obvious distaste, not seeing the other two jerk their heads towards him in surprise. "It must be the balance our Lord and Lady spoke of, all those years ago, right after they'd, um, done what they did. You remember, they said, 'Look at us, can you see us? In us, in us both, you see the balance that forever reigns in the world.'" He stopped talking, looked expectantly at the other two.

Red picked up where Weiss had left off. "'Good and evil, light and dark, air and earth, fire and water, male and female," she said, eyes beginning to shine. "I cannot _believe_ I ever forgot about that. It's so _true_."

"'All the things that make up life, you see in us. Point, counterpoint. That is what we mean to perfect, and that is what you are a part of. You may not see it now, but given time, you will. Let it grow inside you. And when the moment comes, you will truly understand what it is to be human,'" Sable finished reverently. He shook his head. "Dammit, those two were brave..."

There was a long, long silence, not unpleasant, as each of the three was lost in his or her own thoughts.

"How strange it is, to be human, if this is what it is," said Red, at length. "So many questions and doubts and... and..." She snapped her fingers, trying to think of the right word. "And so many..."

"Feelings?" prompted Sable.

"Exactly!"

Weiss tipped his head to one side, looking thoughtful, and said, "Not entirely bad, I think, not even for us. Feelings are probably the reason the three of us never wanted to split up and walk the Earth alone, ghosts or no ghosts. Whatever we are now, those feelings make us... _real_. Ah, I'm not sure how to explain it, but you know what I mean."

Red considered this, said, "What the humans call 'need for company', do you mean?"

Weiss shrugged. "Need for company, friendship, call it what you will. Names don't really matter. It's what's inside that counts, eh?" he said, eyebrows raised, and held out his hand to the woman, smiling.

She sniggered in spite of everything. "How very human." And took his hand, held out her own to Sable.

He took it, in turn, and grasped Weiss's too. "Well then, my friends. Here's hoping all sacrifices were not in vain."

"You mean -"

"Yes."

The three of them sat there, in a circle, not speaking, in perfect concord amid the chaos surrounding them, not touching them.

And near, and far, and everywhere, a tall, hooded man was busy with his scythe.


	7. Chapter Four: Balance

_A/N: Please take a moment to have a look at this: lunissa. deviantart. com/ gallery/ #/ d4hinal_

_Thank you._

_–––_

_Chapter Four_

_Balance_

_–––_

Over the years, Aziraphale had come to realise three things.

First and foremost among these was the highly comforting insight that, however horrible the atrocities that he, all unconscious of any wrongdoing, all convinced that he was acting in the name of Heaven, had committed in the course of six thousand years, his acknowledgement and acceptance of and contrition for these deeds were the first and greatest step on the path to peace. And that these were things he could do.

At first, he'd suspected himself of having fabricated an excuse, of playing a cowardly trick in order to justify his life in his own eyes, thus driving himself even further away from the final goal of redemption. It had not, however, taken him long to see that there was, indeed, no hypocrisy involved. His guilt was real, always had been. One particular memory had confirmed this beyond the shadow of a doubt.

A tombstone with one date. They'd only needed one.

He couldn't bear to think about it for too long at a time. He just couldn't.

Filth.

And yet... His own ancient pain, did that count for nothing? It had to, didn't it?

The second thing he'd grasped, a logical consequence of the first, was that, with repentance, redemption was not just an unreachable dream: it was truly possible. The horrible, mind-numbing fear that would often beset him during the first few... centuries? was gradually being replaced with hope, the tentative hope that the path would actually come to an end, someday.

It was something that had started after he'd peered into that first mirror, long ago. Of course, there had been - and still were, if he was perfectly honest - a good many relapses into terror, the terror that this place would be his dwelling place forever, but such relapses were to be expected, really. They were only natural, he supposed.

Finally, he was aware - how could he _not_ be? - that the feeling of something having been forgotten-not-quite-forgotten had become a nigh-unbearable itch in his brain. This feeling was mixed with the most curious sense of desperation, growing ever stronger, occasionally even drowning out the ever-present guilt. It was so curious, because it wasn't _his_. He was often afraid, yes, and always at least slightly depressed, but never actually desperate. It was like an echo from another world, ghostly, intangible, despite its strength.

It was really very strange.

–––

Hold on, there at that bend in the path, was that...

Yes, yes, it was.

Another mirror.

Aziraphale at once hurried towards it, no longer frightened as he had been the first time, but inexplicably eager for another vision, another lesson.

Just like before, he stopped some ten feet away from the thing, and, stepping closer, examined it. Hmmm... How unusual. This mirror's frame was not made of a _single_ kind of wood, as would have been customary. Rather, it was an intricate mosaic, composed of interlocking pieces of _three_ different kinds of wood: white cedar, red oak, and blackwood, dark as could be. Each piece was decorated with stylised representations of crowns, swords, and scales, always one of each. They struck a chord in Aziraphale's mind, but he didn't know why.

It was then that the sands were cleared away. Aziraphale had been expecting it, this time, and was not startled. Not by that, at least. The people in the mirror saw to all the shock.

It took Aziraphale a few seconds to recognise them. When he did, his heart twisted within him, and tears sprang into his eyes. He desperately wanted to say something, anything, stammer out a too-late apology, but he couldn't find the words.

It was who they were, and it was their faces.

A boy in white and a woman in red, sitting, and a man in black, standing, against a background of destruction. All three were looking straight at him, and all three wore looks of kindness and compassion, rather than reproach.

–––

He sat in front of that mirror for a long, long time, not thinking, not even trying to. Just looking. The sight cut, but he couldn't tear his eyes away.

Kindness.

Compassion.

How long had it been since anyone had felt those things towards him? No-one ever had, as far as he could recall.

Or wait a minute - and he frowned - hadn't there once been someone, one single soul, who... who...

Oh.

Right.

Under the veil.

Typical.

Ah, well. At least now he knew that it was a person under there, not an object. That was worth something, surely.

With a shake of the head, he dismissed this train of thought. Not important, and probably just a constant figment of his imagination, anyway.

He turned his attention back to the picture. Those three. Each of them a victim of his, killed out of selfishness. Yes, it was true, he himself had suffered inside for millennia, but was that really any excuse? Now, ordinarily, Aziraphale would not have cared. They were personifications, after all, not real people. And yet... The complete pardon in their eyes, pardon for _him_, their murderer, it made them look so... so... blessedly _human_. Where had they found the incredible strength to be that?

And that was when he saw.

They were touching, the three of them.

The boy, seated on the ground, one hand adjusting his crown, the other clasped in the woman's, as she sat on a boulder, holding on to the pommel of the sword planted between her feet. The man, standing tall and straight beside her, a hand on her shoulder, the other toying with a pair of scales.

Could that be where they found their strength? In each other? Was it this that gave them such balance?

Balance.

Perhaps there was more to the concept than just this.

Perhaps, in killing them, he had been deceiving himself, had nearly made a fatal mistake.

Perhaps wiping out whatever was evil, whatever one _perceived_ to be evil, didn't really solve anything.

Perhaps both good _and _evil were needed to keep the world turning.

Perhaps the two edges of the knife struck a kind of balance, too, like light and darkness.

Perhaps, if those three could... _overlook_ what he'd done, that meant there were others like them, who could do the same.

Perhaps he could finally start letting go of his past deeds, himself.

Perhaps... Perhaps...

And the mirror fell apart before his eyes.

Aziraphale blinked in surprise, and felt a pang of regret at the loss of the homely sight. It had been so restful. Ah, well, and he shrugged and sighed. No help for it. At least he'd had it, for a little while.

Time to move on again, then, he supposed.


	8. Chapter Five: Break

_A/N: Please take a minute to have a look at this: lunissa. deviantart. com/ gallery/#/d4i6lmn_

_Thank you._

_–––_

_Chapter Five_

_Break_

_–––_

Caphriel felt like he was slowly going insane.

No wonder, really. He slept three hours a night, on average, ate just enough to keep his human body from outright collapsing. Force of will was what truly kept him going, nothing else.

The question was: kept him going, why? From a sense of duty? For love of God's grand, great, wonderful Creation?

_Please_.

Caphriel had once loved looking at the sky. The sun, the moon, the stars. Their steady, regular motions, predictable at every step, had never failed to give him a feeling of security, of certainty that at least one thing in this beautifully infuriating world could be counted on to always be the same.

But that had been before... before. Whenever he gazed up there _now_, he could only think and fantasise about how splendid it would be if they were to all come tumbling down, the sun, the moon, the stars, all forsaking Heaven to come and play in his Hell. Sackcloth of hair, but of course!

Snapping out of this ever more frequent delirium would be like having his throbbing head shoved in a bucket of ice water. The dazed, freezing numbness was always nice, but all too soon, sensation would come rushing back, and he'd find himself right amongst the humans again, the humans and their lives.

The humans. Hateful creatures, every single one of them. Their lives, their short little lives, so meaningless, so pointless, revolving only around themselves, their worthless possessions, their petty ambitions, their skin-deep emotions.

Lucky bastards.

But why couldn't he stop helping them? Why did he still bother? Why did he still _care_, when no-one cared for him? Why didn't Upstairs call him back, let him rest, send a replacement down here? Let someone _else_ bear the burden of over six billion souls for a change! Why couldn't he have a little _peace_, after nearly seven thousand years? Hadn't he done enough already?

Or, what it all boiled down to: why could he not forget? Why must the same scene always be playing in his head, worse than ever when he could no longer keep himself awake? Why could he not let _go_?

Whenever it all became more than he could bear, whenever he simply couldn't take his life anymore, he would do the very opposite of letting go. He'd run, run from wherever he was in the world back to the one place that could be said to offer him shelter from it: the bookshop. He found himself gravitating there more and more often, staying there for longer and longer at a time.

Pathetic weakling.

What had become of his fine, angelic resolutions? He _still_ hadn't been able to say goodbye to that blasted walking stick, kept it near him at all times, laid it beside him when he slept. All the scorch marks had been carefully removed from it, long ago. It was the dearest thing in the world to him now.

It was absolutely sickening. What, _what_ was he turning into? What kind of angel _was_ he? Why couldn't he do his job like he always had? Was his self-respect _completely_ gone? Three fucking quarters of a millennium, and instead of getting better, he was becoming more and more incapable of functioning, of _living_, because of the gaping emptiness inside him.

Wretch. Miserable wretch. Was he, then, so debased that he truly could not exist without the very antithesis of himself moving around in the world, that he could not exist without...

...without...

Zirah.

His name, Zirah's name, was written in living ink all over the walls of the bookshop's little upstairs bathroom. All over the floor and ceiling, too. It had taken Caphriel hours, his hands and neck had screamed for mercy, but it had been highly therapeutic, all the same. An unfading testament of unfading adoration.

_God_.

When he'd finished, he'd staggered out of there, dizzy and drained, dropped onto the little bed like a stone, and slept for three whole days to recuperate. Dreamlessly, for once. That alone would have made it all worthwhile.

When he'd finally woken up, starving, and remembered his handiwork, he'd run outside, in the middle of the night, dashed into the nearest alley, and been very sick behind the dustbins. What had he been _thinking_? Had he lost his _mind_? Well, seven days without sleep could do strange things to a person.

He hadn't set foot in that bathroom since. But, looking back on it, he felt no regrets for what he'd done there. It had felt so _right_, as though it actually meant something, had made a difference, somehow.

Zirah...

Once, in America, only a few decades ago, he'd jerked out of uneasy slumber, dream still pulsing before his open eyes, had rushed out onto the balcony of the sleazy motel room before he knew what he was doing, and screamed out, "I love you, Zirah, I love you!"

When the other guests, rightfully furious at him, had thrown open their windows and demanded to know what in Hell was wrong with him, he'd broken into hysterical laughter. He'd been kicked out less than fifteen minutes later.

Now, sitting on the old leather sofa in the - to his lasting shame - perfectly preserved bookshop, the walking stick resting across his knees, Caphriel knew two things with absolute certainty.

One. The string that was - barely - holding him together was being eaten through, fiber by fiber.

Two. As long as it still lasted, he would continue to do his job, faithfully, resentfully, to the best of his ability. And when he could stand it no longer, and he knew that day would come, then the world could go hang. _He_ would.

Zirah...

And Caphriel burst into tears.


	9. Third Interlude: Mercy

_A/N: Please take a moment to look at this: lunissa. deviantart. com/ gallery/ #/ d4iuw7s_

_Thank you._

_–––_

_Third Interlude_

_Mercy_

_–––_

It was a miserable thing, truly, to hate the work of one's own hands.

Regret, remorse, were not feelings that Azrael was used to dealing with. And why should he be? From the moment that the first woman and the first man had set their teeth in the fruit, his work had begun. An unpleasant task in the eyes of many, but an essential one, and one that had always afforded him a sense of profound fulfilment.

What many humans did not, could not, or would not see, was that life and death were two halves of an eternal, unerring cycle, by which balance was preserved in the world.

Birth.

Life.

Death.

Rebirth.

It had always been so beautiful in Azrael's sight, so utterly perfect. And with every string he cut, at its appointed time, early or late, he knew he was contributing to, was maintaining that beauty, that perfection, and his contentment had been complete.

The Grim Reaper, he was often called, but he was not grim, and he reaped only those souls whose moment had arrived.

His scythe had claimed them in countless different ways. Countless different shades of death. The peaceful passing away of old age, the lengthy, lingering extinction by illness, sudden death by accident, brutal murder, more brutal suicide, even the merciful, early end for those bodies born too weak to sustain life for long. And sometimes, but very, very rarely, the glorious, awe-inspiring sacrifice of one life to save another, something the angel of death had always admired, even though it would always briefly pain him to cut off souls so brave.

Briefly, never for very long.

And then a young boy and an even younger girl had stepped right into the midst of busy traffic, and had forced Azrael to do something that, even now, he could hardly bear thinking about. And they'd even _thanked_ him for it.

His Lord and Lady.

For every living thing, the moment of death was determined at the moment of birth. Whether or not that death was by choice, it was foreseen, fixed, could not be changed.

_They_, however, and they alone, had been free. Free to choose the hour of their own passing, to summon him, as it were, at a time appointed by themselves, and by no other. Chosen and summoned, they had. Soon. Too soon. And for what? To aid in the redemption of a being trapped within himself for millennia, and for the salvation of another, whose heart had died by his own hand.

They had seen what was to be done, and, without hesitation, without question, they _had_ done it, out of a compassion so great that any angel would have been at a loss to comprehend it.

Any angel, that was, except one.

And as Azrael watched him, as he always did, walking up to the door of the block of flats where he lived, face wholly impassive and eyes hidden by black sunglasses to mask the endless, shrieking agony behind and within, he, figurative heart filled with pity, looked at his own skeletal hands and the innocent blood thereon, and shuddered.

He reached into the air in front of him, and took hold of a shining piece of white string, heartbreakingly beautiful as the soul of the one whose life it measured. Although, perhaps, 'measured' was not the right word, since it was all connected, no beginning and no end.

He gently closed his fingers round it, and vanished. Azrael was one who kept his promises, and who always, always carried out his orders to the letter.

Even if those who had given them were dead.


	10. Chapter Six: Innocence

_A/N: Everyone, please take a moment to have a look at these two pictures:_

_lunissa. deviantart. com/ gallery/ #/ d4jipsn and lunissa. deviantart. com/ gallery/ #/ d4jiqji_

_Thank you._

_Also, soundtrack updated on profile page._

_–––_

_Chapter Six_

_Innocence_

_–––_

Aziraphale wasn't feeling very well, these... days.

There was something wrong with his head. It didn't hurt, and the insanity wasn't coming back, for which he was deeply thankful, but he couldn't seem to properly _focus_ on anything, for some reason.

Whenever he attempted to start up a train of thought, whether it concerned his past life, or the two visions he'd been given, his mind would automatically derail, his thoughts either becoming far too hazy to make sense, or shooting off in a dozen trivial directions. What on earth was it supposed to matter to him what kind of breadsticks he'd once had in a French restaurant in the incredibly remote past? Or how he'd once dug through a pile of black clothes - he'd never even _worn_ black clothes! - to take hold of... But even in his current state, his mind would quickly shy away from such things. That he'd started to come to terms with his past didn't mean he had to _like_ it, after all.

But the most unsettling thing out of all this was that, in every one of those pointless scraps of memory, the veiled one - as Aziraphale had come to call them, whoever they were - played a part, looming larger and larger in Aziraphale's mental landscape, but would never let themselves be known. It was like looking at random bits of film, with one of the actors entirely cut out, even their voice.

When the thought of this unknown person became very strong, Aziraphale tended to lose the ability to walk straight. It was a wonder he didn't permanently stray from the path and wander off over the trackless sands, what with all his veering left and right, so dizzy and light-headed. These attacks, for lack of a better word, were becoming more and more frequent, too. There was no physical cause; rather, it was a sensation as though his very own counterweight was missing, whatever _that_ meant, and he didn't know where or how to find it.

He had never felt so lost.

–––

He had come upon another mirror, the third one. Its frame wasn't made of any kind of wood Aziraphale had ever seen or even heard of, but it was _magnificent_. It was wood, but it gleamed like polished metal, shimmering silver and gold, blent into one. There were no carvings on it whatsoever: it was smooth and satiny-looking, utterly pristine. It looked like it came from a tree cut down in Eden, if such a thing had been possible. Anyway, that was rather irrelevant now. The mirror itself was what really mattered.

He settled down in front of it, and waited patiently for the whirling sands to clear away. When they did, however, he was left blinking for a minute. Who in the world were these?

He saw the reflections of a boy and a girl, both in profile. The boy looked to be in his mid-teens. Blond hair and blue eyes he had, and he was dressed in an old T-shirt, faded jeans, and a scruffy pair of trainers. The girl, brown-haired and hazel-eyed, was very, very young indeed, just a tiny child. There was a picture of what looked like a sheep or a lamb on the little blue dress she had on. She was seated on the boy's arm, lifted up high enough to be able to look him straight in the eyes. She had one arm around the boy's neck.

Plainly dressed though they both were, Aziraphale had the distinct impression that he was looking at pure-blooded royalty, and he had to resist the urge to bow his head to the ground.

All these details Aziraphale noted and dismissed in less than a second. Two other things held his attention riveted.

The first of these was this: each child was holding a coronet over the other's head. Neither actually put it down, simply held it up a few inches.

The crown meant for the boy, Aziraphale could see at a glance, was an absolute masterpiece of refined workmanship. Pure gold it was, worked all over in delicate filigree, and inlaid with precious stones, rubies and emeralds and sapphires, small and few, but exquisite. It looked exactly right for the boy's regal head.

The one meant for the girl was considerably simpler, but no less beautiful. It was made entirely of silver, and more closely resembled a garland than a crown. A wavy band of silver, like a vine, decorated with leaves and flowers, so perfectly wrought that one could almost imagine catching their fragrance, like the scent of spring. It was very fitting for her, he thought, looking at her soft, round little face.

But this, even this, was not as striking as the looks of affection those two gave each other. They looked like a brother and sister, sharing a peaceful moment. It was plain as day, in their smiles and their eyes.

As Aziraphale gazed upon them, a nagging sense of familiarity began to build in the back of his skull. It couldn't be because of the girl: he was morally certain that he'd never seen her in his life. Which left the boy... Wait, wait, it was coming to him, yes, that boy was...

Oh.

_Oh_.

Of _course_. How could he have forgotten?

Adam Young. The Antichrist. Son of his old Master.

Well, that was one of them cleared up. Now for the girl. Aziraphale felt faintly puzzled that the sight of Adam Young didn't upset him any more than it did, after so long, but somehow he felt that it was imperative to know who the little one was, first and foremost. All the rest could wait until later.

Now then, and he peered at her, at the both of them, with deep concentration. He was confident that he'd find the answer, but he would have to be logical and sensible about it. What information did he have to go by? Well, each of the previous mirrors had shown him beings of equal rank: the first, Hastur and Ligur, two Dukes of Hell; the second, Pollution, War, and Famine, three Riders of the Apocalypse. Good. So, logically, the two before him now could be supposed to be of equal rank as well. Again good. Now, what being did he know of that was of equal rank with A... dam...

Something clicked in his brain, and the bottom promptly fell out of his stomach.

No, that was impossible. _Impossible_.

Wasn't it? Surely it had to be.

He stared at her to the point of straining his eyes. Only now did he see that her coronet was decorated with something besides flowers and leaves. Those looked like... thorns?

Aziraphale's jaw dropped. So it was true. She was the one. The Lamb. Agnus dei. The Christ Child hi- _her_self. And then he _did_ bow his head to the ground for a moment, struck dumb by the realisation.

But... But what was the meaning of this? The mirrors only showed him those he'd killed, so he could better realise his sins, learn from them, and repent; he understood that much. Which was why none of this made any _sense_. He'd never hurt Adam Young, not really. He had been about to once, but someone - the veiled one - had stopped him, somehow. Besides, the Adam in the mirror was clearly a few years older than the boy he'd known, so it couldn't be that. And he was still positive that he'd never even _met_ the girl. So what on earth -

Wait.

Wait a moment.

Did the mirrors show him those he'd killed, or the ones for whose death he was responsible? An insignificant-seeming nuance, but in reality, it was nothing of the kind. However, even granting this to be the case, it still didn't explain any of this. How could he possibly have caused the deaths of two such beings, years after he'd died? The whole thing was patently absurd.

Sensing that this was something he would never be able to grasp, he put the matter out of his head as hopeless, and began pondering something else that had struck him, something that was only now truly sinking in.

The Antichrist. The Christ. Two beings, existing to be mortal enemies to one another. How could it be otherwise, given how diametrically opposed their respective sides were, and how they were the very incarnations of those sides? And yet, here they were, together in perfect harmony, like brother and sister. Indeed, the more Aziraphale looked, the more he became convinced that this was truly what they were, if not in flesh, then certainly in spirit. Was it, then, possible for one of Hell and one of Heaven, for two creatures as opposite as the darkness and the light, to unite as one? Under so much hate, could love lie buried?

Aziraphale shook his head. No, that could never be. It was one of the fundamental laws of the world, and he didn't think that even these two could break them. And yet... What if it _could_ be? What then?

No sooner had he thought this, than the reflection vanished and the mirror fell apart, like the two before it.

Oh. Well, it seemed he'd learnt his lesson, then.

He got to his feet, and continued on down the path, a path, he was certain now, that led to an end. Even as he did so, and considered the conclusion he'd arrived at just before the mirror had disintegrated, a dull ache, not of the body, started up in his chest, and he got the strangest feeling, deep down inside, as though a vital part of him was missing. Not just his counterweight, oh no. Something far more important than that.

But what?


	11. Chapter Seven: End

_A/N: Please take a moment to have a look at this: __lunissa. deviantart. com/ gallery/ #/ d4k7sqv_

_Thank you._

_–––_

_Chapter Seven_

_End_

_–––_

It was over. He was through. He could not and would not bear it any further.

For a full thousand years Caphriel had fought, struggling to keep his head above the water, to keep on doing his job, to remain true to his nature. But, little by little, it had all come apart, and he with it, and where did he stand now?

He'd tried his hardest to go on loving or, at the very least, putting up with humanity for as long as he could, but now, he was hardly still capable of seeing humans as living things. They were all shadow puppets to him, these days, flitting about here and there before they melted into nothing. Caphriel couldn't care less.

He no longer travelled, either. This, too, had been a gradual process. First he'd become incapable of leaving England. Then London. Then Soho. And finally, inescapably, the bookshop. It had been five years since he'd taken up permanent residence there.

He'd venture outside only to buy some dubious, nondescript food every now and then, always at night, when he felt safest, but that was all. He hadn't even been near St James's in centuries. As for the money he paid the shopkeeper with, he made it himself. Sure, it went against the rules, but Caphriel was long past all that, now. It had never even occurred to him to simply create the food and be done with it. Perhaps it was instinctive, and those scarce trips outside were a way of preserving his disturbingly tenuous hold on reality. No point in that, really.

As for personal hygiene, well, it would have fallen by the wayside long ago, but he couldn't just _let_ it. The bathroom was off-limits, entirely taboo, but a thought sufficed to keep clean. (Which was another break of the rules. How terrible.) It wouldn't do, after all, to go about filthy and smelling like a sewer, not around the books. What would Zirah have said, in his hurt way? He'd always taken such good care of them.

Zirah.

There was no longer a single thought in Caphriel's head that did not revolve around him, not a feeling in his heart that did not do the same.

Zirah.

When he wasn't sitting in glazed-over insensibility, Caphriel spent his time cursing and reviling himself. Why had he done it? Why could he not have shown more compassion, given more love? He did not deceive himself, even now: he knew that he would never have been able to fix Zirah, not even Christ in person could have done that, but that wasn't the point. He should have persevered anyway. He should have been an anchor for Zirah, shut his eyes to whatever he did in his dreadful innocence, should have gone on providing him with unconditional love and support, no matter that he would have been pouring it down a bottomless pit. It could have _done _something, could have _meant_ something, however insignificant. A teardrop on the fire. Just a little comfort. _That_ Zirah had deserved. But not death.

Zirah.

Always and forever the love of his life, as long as that life would endure. For six millennia, Caphriel had seen him and his suffering, ocean-deep and uncomprehending. No relief, no respite, ever, ever. Adam had been right about that, too, that fateful day in Lower Tadfield. Zirah had suffered from himself. If that thought in that place at that time had never occurred, how good he would have been then. A credit to all the Heavenly Host. It had always lain dormant behind and beneath the brokenness. Caphriel had always known this. Beautiful and shining, beyond compare. And he would have been Caphriel's angel.

Zirah.

It was with a pang of anguish that Caphriel had realised that he could no longer remember what Zirah's name had once been, in the Beginning. Caphriel had never thought of him as anything other than Zirah.

Caphriel should have listened to Adam, that day. It was true: killing Zirah had been Caphriel's right and his alone, and once it had been done, there could be no turning back. But it had changed nothing. It had not made the world a better place. The proof of this was literally everywhere, outside the bookshop. The whole world was, had never been anything other than, a hellhole. Caphriel saw that plainly, now. Zirah had hardly even put a dent in the goodness of the world. The humans had done practically all of it themselves. The truth was that Zirah had died for no reason at all.

Caphriel laughed, once.

Lying on his back, on the bed in Zirah's old bedroom, Caphriel made his final resolution. There was only one possible outcome. And it made perfect sense.

Caphriel had never been important enough for a flaming sword, or even a flaming pin, but there was no need for those fancy things. A simple kitchen knife, imbued with a little of his power, would do just as well. There was fitness in that, a kind of poetic justice. Holy water for the... for what Zirah had been, an angelic knife for the angel. There was even a touch of ritual to it. Zirah would have liked that. That was nice.

But Caphriel wouldn't go downstairs yet, no, not quite yet, just a little longer. Just a little more time to lie here and think of Zirah and torture himself. Just a little more time to feel his heart freeze over, as the last bit of will to live died out of its blood. And then he'd get up and head down to the kitchen, and, with the walking stick grasped firmly in one hand - for he refused to let go of it, even in death - he'd get it over with. It wouldn't take long, he was certain, neither the waiting, nor the deed.

_Zirah..._

Just a little more time.

_Zirah..._

Just one more fibre.

_I love you._

Caphriel smiled.


	12. Chapter Eight: Ocean

_Please, take a moment to have a look at this: lunissa. deviantart. com/ gallery/ #/ d4llu5e_

_Thank you._

_Also, soundtrack updated on profile page._

_–––_

_Chapter Eight_

_Ocean_

_–––_

The lack of focus and the bouts of dizziness had long gone, but things most definitely had not improved. Aziraphale didn't think he could take it much longer.

Over time, the ache in his heart and the feeling of missing something had grown exponentially. Now, it felt like he was being stabbed at every step, and as though he was constantly being sliced in half, right down the middle. This pain was much more ancient, he knew, than the day he'd seen that third mirror. It had always been there, but it had been hopelessly buried under mountains of madness, far beyond his ability to feel. And he _still_ didn't know what it was all about!

There was a strange rushing sound in his ears. It had been there for hours now, getting stronger and stronger. It reminded him of something, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. Still, he didn't mind. It was oddly soothing for some reason.

There was a rather steep-looking hill in front of him. He thought of going around it, but it stretched on left and right, as far as the eye could see. He had no choice but to climb.

With great difficulty, he scaled it, regularly sliding back downward as the flour-fine black sand gave under his hands and feet. When he finally reached the top, he remained on his hands and knees for a moment to catch his breath. Then he got to his feet, brushed himself off, looked up...

...and stood entirely transfixed.

He had expected, quite naturally, to see the vast expanse of sand that he'd grown accustomed to over the centuries, with countless stars shining above. Instead, he now found himself looking out over an endless ocean, with little waves lapping against the shore.

When, after a long time, the shock began to abate, it was replaced by a sudden, frantic desire to get down there. Aziraphale had no idea where it came from, but he could not ignore it, not for a second.

Half running, half falling, he raced down the slope, cleared the distance between the foot of the hill and the surf in record time, and knelt down right at the water's edge, knees a mere inch from getting wet.

For a long while, he made no further move, simply studying the water with an intensity of interest that he hadn't felt in ages, if ever. Truly, it was maddening. The colour of the water, that particular shade of grey... Oh, he knew it was connected to something, something so immensely important that his mind could never hope to grasp it, and yet he couldn't recall what it was, no matter how hard he tried. What was the _matter_ with him?

Eventually, he shrugged, shook his head, and decided to give up. It seemed that, however many things he'd grown to understand over the years, the most important thing, whatever it was, would always remain hidden. Would he, then, _never_ get out of this place?

He sighed and, on impulse, dipped his hands in the water. He frowned. Hmmm. That was strange. He would have expected it to be cold, like seawater normally was, but it was actually rather warm, the same temperature as his hands, perhaps even a little warmer. He cupped his hands, and brought some of the water up to his mouth, to take a sip. More and more curious. It _was_ salty, yes, but not nearly as much as it should... have...

Oh.

Oh _no_.

It hit him then. Hit him like a fist to the gut, like a knife to the chest. The veil had been torn away at last from his innermost mind, from his innermost heart, and now he knew, with devastating, mind-shattering clarity, with hideous, searing sanity, what that colour signified.

Eyes. A pair of eyes.

He recognised the pain now, well enough.

–––

All was peaceful and tranquil, glittering and calm. The fine, never-stirring sands, the velvety blackness of the sky, the milky brightness of the stars, the gentle stir of the waves.

All was peaceful and tranquil, save for a single, wild figure on its knees, shrieking and raving up at the unmoved, unmoving heavens.

"Give me back! Give me back, I tell you, back! Take me home, home to him! Oh _God_, can't you see what's happening? Look at this, just _look at this_! How many more tears must he shed? Take me back, I say!"

He couldn't _take_ this anymore. He sprang to his feet, cried out at the top of his lungs, loud enough to reach to the other side of the ocean, calling a name that hadn't passed his lips in aeons.

"Caphriel! Angel! Listen to me, listen to my voice! I love you, Caphriel, I love you! My angel! Beloved! I'm coming back, Caphriel, they can't keep me away! Hold on, and remember that I love you! _Caphriel!_"

He stopped, panting, throat burning sore. He looked around. Peace and tranquility, everywhere, in all directions.

He screamed the scream of nightmare.

At this moment it began to rain.

–––

Steady as a pillar, Azrael stood atop the hill, watching it all. Without looking, he plucked a circle of black string, with no beginning and no end, beautiful as a starless winter's night seen from the warmth of a fire, from the air in front of him, and peered at it closely. He nodded. Already it was starting. As, and he turned his eyeless gaze to the piece of white string in his other hand, as was the case for the other.

Looking away from the strings and down at the half-mad figure below him, howling and weeping, tears and fists bruising the sand, Azrael nodded again. It wouldn't be much longer now.


	13. Chapter Nine: Sanity

_A/N: Please take a moment to have a look at these:_

_lunissa. deviantart. com/ gallery/ #/ d4lrkb7 and __www. youtube. com/ watch?v=M2EvHTA4n-Y_

_Thank you._

_–––_

_Chapter Nine_

_Sanity_

_–––_

An electric shock shot through Caphriel, and he sprang from the bed. Turning in every direction, frantically scanning the walls and ceiling, he cried out, "Zirah! Zirah, answer me, please! I know you're there, I can hear you! Where are you, Zirah? Tell me where I can find you! I'll do anything, _anything_! Just come back to me, Zirah! Please, Zirah, say something again! _Zirah!_"

He stopped, closed his mouth, clenched his teeth hard enough to crack them, and felt his knees give out under him, as the realisation of what had just happened sank in fully, like spikes of ice-cold metal.

He'd gone mad.

It had finally happened. He'd gone mad.

He'd heard Zirah's voice, that beloved, golden voice, after one thousand years, as clearly as though he'd been in the same room with him. And Zirah had called his name, had said he loved him, and was coming back. He'd sounded so lost, so desperate. And all that was impossible, because Zirah was gone. He no longer existed, not a trace of him, not here, not anywhere, because for beings like him and Caphriel, there was no afterlife. Besides, Zirah had never loved him.

Insanity was the only possible explanation, and Caphriel was glad of it. It meant that the long wait was over now, and Caphriel could at last cut his own string. But there was one more thing that needed to be done first.

"I love you too, Zirah," Caphriel said quietly, while tears went dripping down his face like rain. There, the truth had been spoken for the last time, no matter that it had been in answer to a hallucinated lie. Caphriel would not die untrue.

Blinded by his tears, Caphriel groped his way from the room, and stumbled down the narrow staircase, keeping a firm grasp on the railing. Death by broken neck was not how he'd planned it, after all. It wouldn't be permanent enough. He had to do this right.

He reached the bottom of the stairs, and moved down the corridor, heading for the kitchen, running his fingers along the wall to find his way. Then his hand struck something, something unfamiliar, and the sudden white-hot pain brought him to a temporary standstill. He fell against the opposite wall, feeling sick, and took several deep breaths.

When the worst nausea had passed, he made to move on. It didn't matter to him what he'd hit. Only one thing was important, he thought, as he threw whatever it was an indifferent glance...

...and stopped short again, slowly turned towards the thing. What he saw left him stunned enough to make him momentarily forget about what he'd been doing. What in the world _was _that alien thing, and how had it come here? Most importantly, why did the mere sight of it make Caphriel's heart beat so fast, as though it was about to burst?

Caphriel took a step closer and stood directly in front of it, tilted his head. It looked like a... like a...

...black mirror?


	14. Chapter Ten: Storm

_A/N: Please take a moment to have a look at these:_

_lunissa. deviantart. com/ gallery/ #/ d4mhxox,  
>youtube. com watch?v=HafGSYaxz1g and  
>youtube. com watch?v=LXLxXTlKSc4_

_Thank you._

_Also, soundtrack updated on profile page._

_–––_

_Chapter Ten_

_Storm_

_–––_

Aziraphale couldn't say anything, because Aziraphale was choking.

He lay there, curled up at the water's edge, facing the waves, shaking with noiseless sobs, and he wished he could die, for all his hope was gone.

He had screamed out his love, had screamed out _for_ his love, and then he had heard the answer, as though it had come from right beside him.

Caphriel. Dear angel. Dear, beloved angel. Dearest, dearest Caphriel. Aziraphale's angel.

The sound of his voice, of Caphriel's voice, so familiar, so well-known, had torn Aziraphale's heart to shreds. His angel was suffering, was in so much pain, had cried out for Aziraphale, begged for him, calling him by his old, old name, but Aziraphale could not reach him. His arms ached with the desire, desperate and overwhelming, to wrap around Caphriel and hold him, take his pain away, cherish him forever, never let him go. Such was Aziraphale's love, and it burned him like no fire had ever done.

Caphriel... Oh, _Caphriel_...

"God," said Aziraphale, and his voice was so low that he could barely hear it himself, "he's suffering. I love him, and he's suffering. My angel... My angel is in torment, and he needs me. I need to find him, need to get to him, _please_. He's dying, I can feel it. He doesn't... That must not happen to him, it mustn't, I love him, love him so. Give me back to him, I beg you, I... I can't exist, _don't_ exist, without him. He's mine, my angel, my love. I don't care anymore what happens to me, I'll bear anything, pay any price, no matter what it is, only, only give me back... Oh, Caphriel, dear!"

Aziraphale buried his face in his hands, and his tears trickled between his fingers, and ran away in tiny rivulets, to join with the vast expanse of grey.

Blindly, he stretched out a hand, and felt the waves touch it, oh so gently. The tide was coming in, the waters were rising, and a light rain still fell.

Soon, the flood would overflow him. He knew it, but he would not move, not even to hurry things along. He wanted to die like this, quietly, in Caphriel's embrace, along with him, truly together with him, for the first time and the last. And Aziraphale's last word would be his angel's name.

He smiled, closed his eyes. It wouldn't be much longer now. Already the water was at his wrist...

And then, suddenly, it was over. He could no longer feel the waves. Something was keeping them away.

Angry at the delay, Aziraphale half raised himself on his elbow, opened his eyes, and saw.

Another mirror. The last one. The frame was polished mahogany, Aziraphale noted without the slightest bit of interest. He glared at the thing, cursing it for getting in the way. Another lesson? What did _he_ care for another lesson? Understanding, repentance, redemption, Aziraphale's fate, none of these things mattered to him, nothing mattered except...

And then the black, sandy veil swirled away, and Aziraphale saw what lay behind. At once, he shot up on his knees, and remained staring, open-mouthed, his heart beating so hard and so fast that his whole body shook with it.

It was a man who stood on the other side, looking out into the desert, looking at _him_.

_Oh, my _God_... It's... That's... That's..._

"Caphriel..." Aziraphale breathed. "Caphriel," he said. "Caphriel!" he cried out, still unable to move, the frozen mask that his face had become strained to the snapping point.

His angel let out a strange, broken sound, half-scream, half-sob, and sank slowly to his knees. It was then that Aziraphale realised that this was not another mere reflection. This was real.

But it was not this fact, inconceivable though it was, that sliced straight into and through him, cutting him apart. No. It was sharp, red-hot nails in his eyes, razor-keen knives flaying him to the bone, burning sleet in his bloodstream, and, worst and best of all, cruel, merciful hands, tearing into his chest, ripping out his heart, peeling away the thin remaining layer of madness, and crushing the pitiful, bloodied remains to a pulp.

Because Caphriel had taken off his sunglasses.

_Oh, my... _Caphriel... _Oh, _God_!_

Pain.

Agony.

Desolation.

Anguish.

Hopelessness.

Loneliness.

Guilt.

Heartache.

Heartbreak.

A chronicle of the worst suffering the world had ever known, etched, written and etched, in the clouded dark grey eyes of Aziraphale's dearest angel, of his beloved Caphriel. So old, those eyes, so ancient, so immeasurably sad, so _hurt_. More than anything he had ever wanted, Aziraphale wanted to press his lips to those eyes. But he knew that this was something he would never be able to do. Not anymore, not now.

Caphriel...

At the same time, mechanically, Aziraphale put out his left hand, Caphriel his right. Their fingertips stopped short when they were mere millimeters from meeting, remaining at the exact same distance from the screen of glass-water-sand.

They stayed kneeling like that for a long, long time, staring at each other like statues. Marble and granite could not have been more motionless. At last, drained, emptied, they sighed in final, irrevocable defeat, and sagged forward, tears running in silence down their faces.

Their fingertips touched.

Really _touched._

Both their heads snapped up. They gaped. More impossible than ever to move, to act. Neither wanted to. Their heartbeats, their lives, their very souls, were concentrated in those few, tiny points of contact.

Slowly, tentatively, Aziraphale smiled, still weeping, and lifted his right hand, to try and touch Caphriel's face...

And then, on the desert side of the looking glass, all Hell broke loose.

The dark sky exploded into an inferno, the ocean began to boil, the black sands shot up in whirling columns, and a howling wind whipped against Aziraphale, snatching his breath away. He looked down, and saw a crevice open beneath him. In it lay nothing but darkness. The desert was dissolving, and Aziraphale was trapped in it. Nearly blinded by the wind and sand, he could still feel his angel's touch, but he could no longer see him, and it was horrible to die like this. Yet this was not the worst thing: the worst thing was having to die _now_, without having said to his angel's face...

But Aziraphale would try.

"Caphriel!" he screamed above the roar of the wind. "Caphriel, I -"

The sand got into his mouth then, and the last two words were never spoken. Aziraphale closed his burning, stinging eyes, and felt himself sliding down...

...when, at the very last second, a strong pair of arms seized him, and jerked him forward...

...and he tumbled over, and came to rest on a dusty, slightly mouldy carpet, the smell of old books all around him, together with the same pair of arms from before.

Coughing and hacking to get the sand out of his mouth and lungs, completely unable to see, he instinctively grasped hold of the warm body so close to him. Even in his state of acute physical panic, he knew perfectly well who it was.

The last thing he heard before losing consciousness was Caphriel's voice, speaking one word, a terrible blend of endless joy and endless sorrow.

"Zirah?"


	15. Chapter Eleven: Embrace

_A/N: Everyone, please take a moment to have a look at these:_

_lunissa. deviantart. com/ gallery/ ?catpath=/ #/ d4nbl7q  
>lunissa. deviantart. com gallery/ #/ d4nbn2v  
>lunissa. deviantart. com gallery/ #/ d4nbnt4  
>lunissa. deviantart. com gallery/ #/ d4nbsla  
>lunissa. deviantart. com gallery/ #/ d4nsohn_

_Thank you._

_Also, soundtrack updated on profile page._

_–––_

_Chapter Eleven_

_Embrace_

_–––_

Dawn had bled into morning, had bled into noon, and still Caphriel had not moved from his spot on the hallway carpet, as he lay there with Zirah in his arms. He would have given anything to stretch out that moment until the end of time. Yet for many hours, his brain had refused to accept the reality of it.

Zirah had remained unconscious all that time. Unconscious, but alive, and holding on to Caphriel as though he wanted to crawl inside him. Caphriel had felt Zirah's heartbeat, steady and familiar, every rhythmic thump of that heart opening up another crack in Caphriel's own.

Love.

What he'd seen in Zirah's eyes, in his face, in every line of him, when the two of them had still been on different sides of the looking glass... Caphriel would have sworn before God that it had been love. Love... for him. For Caphriel. From Zirah. But that was impossible, because this was _Zirah_, and Zirah had never loved him. Had never even been able to.

Another crack, deeper.

The sound of church bells striking noon had shocked Caphriel into action. He'd extricated himself from Zirah's arms - which had proved to be remarkably difficult to accomplish, since even in his current state, Zirah had refused to let go - picked him up, and carefully carried him upstairs, so as not to wake him. He'd laid him down gently on the little low bed, and only then had he looked at Zirah's face. The sight of it had finished splitting Caphriel's heart in half.

Zirah had looked so peaceful. So truly serene. When Caphriel had touched his cheek, Zirah had stirred a little, made a tiny sound. He'd even, and of this Caphriel was absolutely certain, he'd even started to smile in his sleep.

Caphriel had fled from the room then.

Now, here he was, in the tiny kitchen, filling a glass of water at the tap. He wasn't giggling, not this time: his face was a mask of stone, and no tears came from his eyes.

He left the kitchen, and headed back upstairs, passing his hand over the glass. Both his hands, in their gloves, were perfectly steady.

He didn't feel anything. Anything at all. He was past that point, now. His heart seemed to be frozen. But it was lava under ice, he knew it, and he had to keep it that way, else he would collapse. There'd be plenty of time for that afterwards.

Caphriel would never understand what accursed miracle had brought his beloved back into his arms after so, so long. But he did know, with all the finality of dead, deadly despair, that the world was not for them, nor they for the world. It would have to end. All end now. Caphriel's love could not coexist with Zirah's hate. Zirah had died, once, hating him. This was simply the way things were, Caphriel reflected, his mind drifting constantly in and out. It was the way things were. There was no escaping it.

Caphriel was tired.

So, so tired.

And Zirah... Zirah had suffered so much, so long, and Caphriel should just stand by and let it all start over again?

No.

No, he wouldn't. He couldn't.

It wouldn't cause Zirah any pain, not this time. Like a pinprick, there and gone. Caphriel would see to that. And for himself, afterwards... There was the knife. And he would not hesitate to use it. After this, why should he?

He pushed open the door to the bedroom, and stopped dead in his tracks, the glass nearly slipping from nerveless fingers. The ice had melted, the volcano had erupted.

No. _No._ Oh, please, anything but this...

Zirah, his Zirah, was awake now, sitting cross-legged on the bed, taking in everything in the cramped little room as though it was an unprecedented marvel.

When the door opened, he at once turned his head towards it, and his face lit up like a flame. His eyes, eyes utterly and perfectly sane, and clearer than pools of rock-water, those eyes, as they looked upon Caphriel, were burning, blazing like blue fire, the fire of a love so strong that the sheer overwhelming force of it slammed into Caphriel's being with all the power of a tsunami, effectively knocking his brain right out of commission.

God, and he'd thought... Entering the countryside around Tadfield, so long ago... It had been a mere tickle compared to this...

Caphriel, had his mind still been even remotely functioning, would have likened the feeling to that of a warm, soft, fuzzy blanket being wrapped carefully round him on an icy winter's night. He would have, that is, if the comparison hadn't been so woefully inadequate. The blanket was wrapping around his _soul_...

All this took place in the split second before Zirah noticed the glass in Caphriel's hand.

Instantly, an expression of pure terror swept over him, and he raised trembling hands in supplication.

"Please don't, Caphriel... Beloved..."

Snap, went the string.

The water evaporated, the glass fell from Caphriel's hand, and he abruptly crumpled to the floor. There was a limit to how much more suffering an already mortally wounded spirit could take, and his limit had now been reached.

Faintly, his dimming eyes registered a blur of fast movement, before he was caught in a pair of warm, welcoming arms. A near-painful bolt of happiness shot through him...

...and then, nothing.

–––

Noon had bled into afternoon, had bled into evening, and still Aziraphale did not move from his spot on the bedroom floor, cradling his dearest angel in his arms, crooning to him softly.

Aziraphale's heart was filled to overflowing, and every beat of Caphriel's was like a drop of sweet nectar falling into it. Aziraphale smiled, kissed Caphriel's cheek, nuzzled it, let out a sigh.

He knew, of course, what Caphriel had been about to do when he'd walked into the room. Aziraphale had been terrified: his greatest nightmare now was to be torn from his angel's side again, because the two of them could not exist without each other. After so many ages of separation, one second would be too much.

He held Caphriel a little tighter.

Nevertheless, Aziraphale had understood. Caphriel only remembered him as the monster he had been. He had, quite logically, believed that things would go back to being what they had been, so, so long ago. Aziraphale certainly couldn't blame him, for how could he have known? Besides, Aziraphale didn't care, not in the slightest, because it wasn't important. Nothing was important now, only, and he kissed him again, only his angel.

"I love you, Caphriel, do you know that, dear?" he whispered, and slipped a hand under the black trench coat, the better to feel the warmth of his angel's skin...

...only to wince, and then shiver in alarm, when he felt the clearly distinguishable ribs.

God, his angel was so _thin_. He'd always rather neglected himself, but this... this was _horrible_. He must not have had a proper meal in ages.

Aziraphale would do something about that. He'd dig up a cookbook - he was sure that there was a medieval one lying about here somewhere - and he'd make his angel all the best things, like alaunder of beef and, what had they been called, oh yes, mon-amys, put some meat on those bones, because it couldn't possibly be healthy to be so thin. Yes, Aziraphale would...

Aziraphale would...

He would...

He...

Caphriel...

Caphriel, dear...

Aziraphale clutched him close, almost tight enough to smother him, and buried his face, wet with tears, in the black hair, crying and crying till it seemed his heart must break, all but cracking open with love and pain.

Oh, _Caphriel_, dear...

"I know you can hear me, my love," he said softly, once his tears began to dry. "You've suffered so much, so long, but now, dear one... That's all over. I'm with you now, and I'll never let you go. I'll make things better now. I promise," he added, in a whisper.

He half rolled onto his back, and pillowed Caphriel's head on his shoulder. An idea struck him then, and he took the sunglasses off Caphriel's nose, and, very gently so as not to disturb him, kissed his angel's eyes. Then, reluctantly, he put the sunglasses back where they had been - Caphriel had never liked being without them - and closed his own eyes, entirely at peace at last, for the first time since Time had begun.

Because here, now, with Caphriel, his angel, safe and warm in his arms, Aziraphale knew that he had been forgiven.


	16. Chapter Twelve: Sacrament

_A/N: Please take a moment to have a look at these:_

_lunissa. deviantart gallery/ #/ d4o2bqr  
><em>_lunissa. deviantart gallery/ #/ d4o2c2a  
>and lunissa. deviantart. gallery #/ d55p6a2_

_Thank you._

_–––_

_Chapter Twelve_

_Sacrament_

_–––_

It was almost completely dark now. The room was lit only by the glow of the lanterns outside.

Aziraphale was sitting on his knees by the bed, leaning on the mattress, where Caphriel was sleeping peacefully, lying on his back, his breathing steady and even and deep.

He looked so relaxed.

So happy.

Aziraphale leaned forward, and placed a light kiss on Caphriel's temple, lingering a little to feel his angel's pulse against his lips. Then he straightened, and went back to staring hard at a spot between his clenched fists and Caphriel's head. Aziraphale's face was very pale, but absolutely calm.

Except that it wasn't, really. Aziraphale wasn't calm at all. He was iced over with shock.

It had started out so innocently. He'd wanted his angel to be as comfortable as possible, so he'd picked him up off the floor and carried him to the bed. Carrying him had been easy. Too easy.

Poor dear...

After he'd put him down, it had occurred to him to undress his angel, because it was never pleasant to have to sleep in one's clothes. Logically, he'd started with the gloves, all but cooing with delight at the thought of being able to cover those beautiful hands in tiny kisses, the backs, the palms, the knuckles, the fingers, the tips of those fingers, one by one. Because Caphriel _had_ had lovely hands. Aziraphale remembered them well.

Then the first glove had come off.

Aziraphale took a deep breath, forced himself to look at those hands again, and bit back the urge to scream and scream and scream.

Two articulated masses of scorched and blackened flesh, with bright red cracks here and there. In one or two places, one could even see the whiteness of bone.

God...

Oh, _God_...

What had his angel _done_ to himself?

Nor had this been all. Continuing on in a kind of near-mindless daze, Aziraphale had soon discovered the badly-healed wound on the side of Caphriel's neck, hidden under a scarf, and the great red welt across his chest.

Aziraphale had almost fainted then. No longer even vaguely aware of what he was doing, he'd covered his angel with a sheet, and staggered to the bathroom for a drink of water. He'd turned the handle, pushed open the door, flipped the light switch and...

...and...

Aziraphale took hold of Caphriel's right arm, lying on the sheet, and, very gently, turned it over. He leaned forward again, and left a trail of kisses along the ancient, still-red scar on his angel's pale skin. It ran from the elbow nearly all the way down to the wrist, neatly following the course of the vein.

Blood.

So much _blood_...

His angel's blood.

And all for love of him.

Caphriel...

Angel...

Why?

_Why?_

Oh, _beloved_...

Aziraphale's heart shattered into fragments.

With a single tearing sob, he dropped forward, took Caphriel's head between his hands, and covered it in kisses, as if he could never get enough, weeping all the while. And, in so doing, his heart was made whole again.

When he lifted his head, he didn't know how much later, he saw that Caphriel, still asleep, was smiling, the corners of his mouth quirked up just a little. And Aziraphale smiled back.

Slowly, he got up, began taking off his clothes. He would not cry anymore, not yet. He would do nothing further to trouble his angel's quiet sleep. When Caphriel woke, Aziraphale would be there by his side, would make him see how dear he was to him. And Aziraphale's angel would be healed.

Aziraphale slipped under the sheet beside Caphriel, lay looking at him, but did not touch him, not even to stroke his hair.

Because, when he did touch him, he wanted to see it in his angel's eyes.

–––

Caphriel was dreaming, and in his dream he was wandering through a beautifully formless landscape suffused with love, the kind of love one found in Heaven, but warmer, more vibrant, more _alive_. And all, all for him. He could have kissed every blade of grass in his path.

From these visions of hot sunlight, blue skies, verdant fields, and murmuring waters, Caphriel awoke, and found that his dreams paled in comparison to reality.

Because a golden voice whispered, "Good evening, my love," a tender, soft hand cupped his cheek, and the unforgotten scent of his beloved, all around him, struck up into his brain, opening the floodgates of his heart. He turned his head quickly, and looked right into smiling blue eyes, warm and bright as the day.

Caphriel bit down on his lip, screwed his eyes shut, and pressed his face against Zirah's, so close to his, even as burning tears squeezed from his eyes. Yes, he was crying, because otherwise his heart would have stopped.

Zirah...

When, as he immediately did, Zirah shifted his hand to the back of Caphriel's dark head and started making little shushing sounds, Caphriel only cried harder.

And then another miracle happened, the second one that day.

Zirah turned his head slightly, and kissed Caphriel's lips.

It was a light, chaste kiss, like Zirah had never given him, and it sent an electric tingle through Caphriel's entire body, starting in his mouth. When the first shock had passed, Caphriel settled into the kiss, and the tingle swelled into an equatorial storm of the ages.

For the love that had already been enveloping Caphriel all around, was singing inside him now, vibrating along with his heart, coursing through his every vein, and Caphriel could have _died_ from the sweetness of it. He'd wanted this so long... _So long_...

When Zirah drew back, all but glowing, Caphriel could only speak a single word. It said everything.

"_Zirah_..."

But Zirah shook his head. "No, my love. Not Zirah. My name," and he gave Caphriel another one of those priceless kisses, "is Aziraphale."

_Aziraphale?_

And Caphriel remembered. Far, far back, to a time beyond Time. That, _that_ had been it, _was_ it, his beloved's true name...

"Aziraphale," he said, slowly, savouring the word, letting it linger on his tongue like the melody it was. "Aziraphale... You... You are Aziraphale! _Aziraphale!_ It's you!" He was almost shouting now, in uncontrollable excitement. All at once, its fever left him, and he quieted down, feeling delightfully weak and helpless. "Aziraphale..." he said again, barely above his breath.

Aziraphale's lip began to tremble. He raised himself on his elbow, leaned over, rested his forehead against Caphriel's, and let out a shuddering breath. "My angel..." he whispered. "Oh, my angel... I've missed you... Missed you... Love you so..." And Caphriel felt tears run over his face.

Not just his own.

"Aziraphale... _Aziraphale_..." he said, or rather, wanted to say. His throat was too tight to make any real sound.

But Aziraphale heard, all the same. He raised his head, took away the black sunglasses, and looked deep into Caphriel's uncovered, wonder-filled grey eyes, so light grey as to be almost colourless. Aziraphale's own, in that moment, were solemn and sad and endlessly soft, blue and deep and meaningful as the sky of a balmy spring morning after rain. He laid a finger on Caphriel's lips, and said, his voice like sacred water to Caphriel's ears, "Shhh, my love... Don't speak... Let me..."

And with that, it began.

"You're so tense..."

Gentle lips touched Caphriel's forehead. His eyes, which closed, even though he didn't want them to, he wanted to _see_...

His cheeks. His nose. His chin. His mouth, and it was wet and warm and indescribably sweet, and Caphriel lost all interest in seeing, he only wanted to feel... and to hear.

"There now, Caphriel, precious one, loved one, soul of my soul, there, shhh, don't move, relax, let me, oh, let me touch you..."

Oh, those hands, those tender, loving hands, and the kisses down his throat and chest...

"Beautiful angel, you're incredibly beautiful, do you know that, beloved, especially those poor, dear eyes, let me kiss them again... There now, dearest, don't cry..."

But Caphriel couldn't help it, any more than he could help the beatific smile on his face. He finally found speech again, said, "A... Aziraphale?"

"Shhh, my love... I am here, and I love you."

This was... Oh, _God_, this was...

Soft caresses and tender kisses, to all the most sensitive parts of Caphriel's body. Aziraphale knew exactly where to find them. He didn't even have to try. And that constant stream of whispered words, sweet nothings, curling around Caphriel like a lullaby tune...

"Caphriel, my angel, my bright, blessed angel, oh, if you knew how good it is, to finally be with you, back with you, together, Caphriel, dear..."

It was so perfect, so perfect...

"Don't be afraid, dear one, I'll be very, very careful... I wouldn't hurt you for the world."

And he took Caphriel's pitiful, ruined bare hands in his, fondled them with lips and fingers, so lightly, like butterfly wings, like balm, and Caphriel melted and dissolved, utterly unable to hold back the long, low groan, from sheer excess of bliss, that broke from his throat. Felt so good... So _good_...

If someone had told him, in that moment, that he'd been translated back up to Heaven, he'd have believed it without question. Or no. He wouldn't have. This was better.

He felt a warm body press against him, opened his eyes, and saw.

Aziraphale was once more lying beside him, now, one hand still upon Caphriel's wrecked ones, the other sliding under his neck, kneading gently, and Caphriel let out a long, heavy sigh, like a breathy, drawn-out "Ohhh" of complete relaxation, as the final vestiges of tension ran out and were lost. He looked at his beloved. "Aziraphale..."

Aziraphale smiled, and Caphriel thought that his face was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen, more magnificent than any sight Heaven could ever hope to produce.

"Look at you," Aziraphale said warmly, tenderly. "You look like you've been - Ah! Dearest, what is it? What's come over you?"

The perfection had shattered. With a strangled scream, Caphriel wrenched himself away from his dearly loved, dearly loving tormentor, and curled up on the very edge of the bed. He barely noticed Aziraphale sit up quickly, could barely even hear his voice anymore, hardly felt the warm touches that sought to comfort him.

_'Look at you...'_

And Caphriel had been instantly thrown back to that one, hellish day, so long ago, the memories of it cutting right into him, again and again and again, just as they had done in his nightmares for centuries.

Oh, Zi- _Aziraphale_...

"Aziraphale..." Caphriel choked out, nearly suffocating. "_Aziraphale_..."

"Dearest, I'm here! I'm right here with you! Tell me what's wrong, I beg you!"

And Caphriel answered. Spoke three short words that summed up a whole millennium of unspeakable agony.

"I killed you."

Silence, dead silence, and Caphriel covered his face with his hands.

But then Aziraphale took his shoulder, turned him round, and, lying down again, pulled him close against his warm, soft body.

"No, beloved," he said, looking straight into Caphriel's eyes. "You didn't kill me. You saved me from myself."

Caphriel's eyes grew wide. "But... But I..."

"Let it go. Let it all go. It's all right, Caphriel. It's all right. You are my angel, my love, from here," and he kissed him, held him tight, "to eternity."

For the first time in seven thousand years, Caphriel smiled through his tears.

–––

Aziraphale sighed, and pressed his lips to the back of Caphriel's head, loving the feel of the fine, black hair. There were no words, no thoughts, possible for how good this felt.

It had been raining, and the warm, wet summer night air breathed in through the wide-open window, smelling of the night, of streets washed clean, and of the linden trees in the park nearby.

It was very quiet. The few sounds that could be heard, the distant hum of traffic, the song of a nightingale far away, only served to deepen the essential stillness.

The bed was very nice, too. Low, soft, not too wide, not too narrow, and with plenty of pillows, that hadn't been there before. The covers had been thrown off. They were not needed.

Yet all this, however pleasant, was nothing, to Aziraphale, when compared to the man in his arms.

The smell of his skin, his hair. The sound, aching and precious, of his breath, precious because it was there, aching because it was light and quick and broken by the occasional sob. Anyone else would have thought that Caphriel longed to get away. But Aziraphale knew that, if he were to let go of his angel now, if he so much as loosened his hold, Caphriel would, in all likelihood, lose his mind. And the same could be said for Aziraphale, himself. This could not be allowed to happen, not again. And for a few seconds, he squeezed Caphriel so tight that the latter was forced to gasp for breath afterwards.

Abandoning these thoughts, Aziraphale focused on the moment, the scent, the sound, and the consciousness of their warm, living, naked bodies, so close together, so real, as he lay spooned around Caphriel, arms around his chest, comforting him, soothing him, loving him.

"Dear..." he whispered. And "Dear... God, I love you so much..."

Caphriel sobbed again, louder. "Oh... Aziraphale..." was all he said. Yet it was enough to finally push the golden knife all the way up to the hilt into Aziraphale's heart. He looked at his angel's helplessly trembling body, and it seemed to him that that smooth pale skin, flawless though it was, and so delightful under Aziraphale's fingertips, was in reality a mass of raw, red scars, rents and tears, leaking out centuries' worth of infected blood.

Pain.

So much pain.

Aziraphale kissed Caphriel's cheek, laid his own against it. Lightly trailing his fingers over his lover's warm skin, causing violent shivers, he asked softly, "What can I do, beloved, to make you see that the nightmare is over?"

Caphriel spasmed, clutched at Aziraphale's gentle, caressing hands with his own leathery ones, and whispered frantically, "I love you, Aziraphale. I love you. Say... Only tell me... Tell me you love me, too."

In answer, Aziraphale held his angel tighter, and half whispered, voice running over with tears, though he shed none, for fear of upsetting the other even more, "Caphriel... Beloved... I can't even begin to express what you mean to me. You are all I want, all I need. I know that..." and he almost choked as his feelings overcame him, "that nothing I can say or do could ever make up for all the pain I've caused you, all your life. I could hold you like this and cry over you for years, with all my heart and soul, but it could never take away all those ages of suffering... Oh... My angel..." And he began to cry anyway.

Caphriel could bear it no longer. He twisted in Aziraphale's arms, and clasped him to his heart. As their tears mingled and they kissed each other again and again, he said, melting with love, "Aziraphale... Aziraphale, don't you see? You're here, you're _you_, and you love me. As long as that's true -"

"Forever, my love."

"Then this is my Heaven. What do I care for what happened in the past, for any of it? You... This... You are my reward. It was all worth it, all of it, because... because..."

"...because you _are_ my Heaven, dear."

Words were lost, now. No matter: they were no longer required.

Aziraphale and Caphriel clung to one another, limbs sweetly tangling together in a sublime, sweaty embrace. The few feeble barriers that had still stood between them crumbled and vanished for good, swept away by the tides of a silent ecstasy that shot through and beyond the flesh to the very confines of the spirit, fusing the two of them in one.

And that's when it happened.

The universe exploded in a million dazzling lights, and Heaven and Hell shook, as something that defied all the tenets of creation was taking place, there, right there in the little bedroom of the old bookshop.

Both of them shot up and apart with the cosmic force of it, and screamed, and their wings burst forth from their backs, entirely of their own accord.

Still reeling from the spiritual shockwave, they looked at each other, and each cried out again at the vision that met his eyes.

Two pearly-grey pairs of wings, like those of a dove, shimmering softly with their own light, breathtaking like those of a bird of Paradise.

They stared at each other for what felt like hours.

Caphriel was the first to find his voice. "Aziraphale?" It sounded like a caress.

"Beloved?" Like an embrace of sound.

"I can... We're not touching, but I can..."

"...feel you..."

"Yes..."

"We are..."

"We are..."

"One..." Aziraphale finished breathlessly.

All at once, the two of them began to laugh, laugh for pure joy, their voices dovetailing, like sweet music. They flopped down on the bed, revelling in their laughter, in the overwhelming feeling of their souls interwoven, like their bodies had been, just now, twisting and coiling together as though they'd never done otherwise.

Finally, as the breeze from outside began to turn chilly, they once again moved together for warmth, covering each other with their wings. A few more softly spoken words, no matter what they were, and the two of them, smiling serenely, drifted off to sleep.

–––

The tall, hooded skeleton who had been watching them, invisible, all this time, looked from the two intertwined beings to the two intertwined grey strings - impossibly, with no beginning and no end - in his hand, nodded, and quitted the room, unseen.

His Lord and Lady would be overjoyed with what he had to tell them.


	17. Epilogue: Sanctified

_A/N: Well, this is it. The final instalment of this story._

_I want to say thank you to all you readers and reviewers out there, for all the support, the kind, wonderful words, and for wanting to read the story at all. I find that words fail me to express my gratitude, so I'll just say: thank you. All of you. You're the best._

_Special thanks go to Lunissa, over on deviantArt, for providing such magnificent illustrations to 'Crucible', all spontaneously and of her own free will. I honestly don't know how she does it, every single week, but I am deeply grateful all the same. *raises glass* Here's to her._

_On this note, since it's tradition by now, please take a moment to have a look at this:_

_lunissa. deviantart gallery/ #/ d4pd7aq_

_Also, for the final time, soundtrack updated on profile page._

_Once again, thank you all._

_Update: fanart for the epilogue._

_lunissa. deviantart gallery/ #/ d4vmmdq  
>lunissa. deviantart gallery #/ 36524629#/ d4vmflf  
>lunissa. deviantart gallery #/ 36524629#/ d4vme6q  
>lunissa. deviantart gallery #/ 36524629#/ d4vmeyq  
>lunissa. deviantart gallery #/ 36524629#/ d4vmftq  
>lunissa. deviantart gallery #/ 36524629#/ d4vmg1x  
>lunissa. deviantart gallery #/ 36524629#/ d4vmj2)_

_Thank you all again._

_–––_

_Epilogue_

_Sanctified_

_–––_

_20th August, 3001_

A boy was sitting slouched on a bench in St James's Park.

He looked to be sixteen years old, or thereabouts, dressed in a pair of faded jeans and an old T-shirt. He was staring, through wisps of curly blond hair falling over his forehead, at the two men standing over by the duckpond, some distance away, holding each other so tight that it was a wonder they were still able to breathe. The boy fairly sniggered at the thought. Not that anyone would have noticed.

After some time, a little girl, certainly no more than five years old, her brown hair in two ponytails, and a picture of a sheep on her blue dress, came dancing and skipping down the path that led by the bench, the sunlight shining through her, and clambered up to sit next to the boy. Neither of them fully acknowledged the other's presence, not yet. They simply sat there, hand in hand, the eyes of each fixed unwaveringly on the same point. Had anyone been able to see them, their heart would have swelled at the looks of quiet, near-spiritual happiness on such young faces.

Finally, the two looked at each other, blue eyes meeting hazel ones, and both smiled.

"It's been five days," said the boy.

"Yes," the girl replied merrily, swinging her legs, "it has."

"How long will it go on?"

"How long will _we_ go on, big brother?" She giggled, and continued, "Don't tell me you've forgotten what I told you when I first came to see you, a few days before the end of our lives. I explained it all to you then. Come now, surely you remember!" She gave him a playful shove. He didn't even budge.

"Oh, I remember, little sister," he answered, and poked her belly, making her double up from the tickles. "We've set them free. They're like us now, aren't they?"

She nodded, eyes shining, still giggling, hands on her stomach. "They are, they are! Free and unbound and beyond good and evil..." She smacked his hand when he tried to poke her again.

"Something above that, eh?" he said.

"Yes, brother, yes!" she cried, and crept on his lap, bounced up and down a little. "They no longer belong to Heaven or to Hell. They're ours now, under our protection, and none shall ever touch them again, from Above or from Below!"

All of a sudden, she fell silent, sat perfectly still on her brother's knee.

"...little sister?"

"They can finally be happy now," she said softly, her little voice saturated with tears. "They've both suffered so much, so long, and now it's... it's over. It's finally, truly over. They can be happy now," she repeated, "from here... to eternity." She bent her head, sat there weeping silently, tears dripping onto her lap. "Oh, my little big brother... I am happy beyond words."

The boy bit his lip, forced back his own tears. "There, there, big little sister. I told you we'd fix it, dint I?"

She wiped her eyes, smiled up at him. "That's true," she said. "That's true."

He smiled back down at her. "That's the little girl I know. Now come on," and he got up with her in his arms, "it's time for us to go, and be born again. The world's waiting for us."

"Mmmm... We'll meet again, won't we?" she asked, laid her little head on his shoulder.

The boy laughed, hoisted her a little higher. "Course we will. We've been together for a thousand years now. D'you think I'd let you go, just like that, after all that time?"

She hugged him, her arms round his neck. "No. No, I don't. As you say, let's go. It is indeed time."

The boy nodded, and headed for the exit, still carrying the girl. They looked back once more at the couple by the pond, who were talking together quietly now, gently, slowly touching, kissing each other every now and then.

With one last wave at the tall skeleton standing in the shadows, watching them go, the boy and the girl were gone. The skeleton, too, waved, then laid a hand upon his heart, his head bowed. He would go and bring back the Three now, and then his dear task would be complete. The Two did not require his help, not this time: they would find their own way back.

Hours later, the two men, arms still around each other, walked out of the park, and headed home for the night.

_The beginning_


End file.
